Apathy or far right idiots? A handful for Europeans decide

This is a Times Online podcast.

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.

Hello, Buglers, and welcome to Bugle issue 78 for the week beginning Monday, the 15th of June, 2009, with me Andy Zaltzman independently verifiable as being here in London and rumour has it in New York City it's the Joe Montana of jokes the Wayne Gretzky of Wisecracks the Billie Jean King of banter and the sea biscuit of satire it's John Oliver I'm the Joe Montana andy I send my punchlines long and I find them with a hail Mary It was interesting, John, that you aligned yourself there with Joe Montana rather than Sea Biscuit.

Well, because you said, what was it you said?

You throw your jokes, you throw your punchlines long.

No, I send them long

and I'll connect with them with the Hail Mary Pass.

Rather than, you know, if you've been the Sea Biscuit, then you'd have just shat them out in a field.

Yeah.

I mean, I guess I'll see myself more as a Montana than a Sea Biscuit.

Right, okay, fair enough.

Chewing set-ups and dumping out punchlines.

Hello, Andy.

Hello, Bugers.

I'm in New York, but, Andy, I am on my way to Bonnaroo later, the

outdoor music festival in Tennessee, where I'm going to be doing stand-up over the weekend.

Now, the important part of this story, though, Andy, is that this means that I'm sharing a bill with Snoop Doggy Dog.

It was about time this happened, and I naturally presumed it would happen a lot sooner.

I like to think that he's sharing a bill with you, mate.

That's a lovely thing to say.

But I would like to take this opportunity to issue a challenge to Mr.

Dog, Andy, who I know is a bugle listener.

I would suggest that for one gig, myself and Mr.

Dog swap audiences.

Just to see what would happen.

And if he he wishes, we can also swap set lists because I, Mr.

Dog, too, have my mind on my money and my money on my mind.

Also, this week, Addie, Ahmed Gilani, the man held at Guantanamo Bay, and now charged with a pretty impressive 280 counts of terrorism after his whole bang business in Kenya, was in New York and they were charging him on American soil for the first time.

Good to have a case this easy as your first coming out of Guantanamo.

Just get an easy win under your belt.

But so I had to go down to shoot some stuff by the courthouse, and it it meant that I was the closest I'd ever been to a known terrorist and I do hope that I've not become radicalized by being that close.

I know that's what people are worried about bringing terrorists onto US soil.

They give off spores, don't they?

It's airborne.

I tried to put my hand over my mouth, but no, you can't help but think it would have got into some orifice.

Also, I had a survival plan ready to go if he escaped.

I was just going to run away in zigzags because I believe that terrorists can only run sideways.

No, no, you're mixing them up.

You've got to go climb up a tree.

That's the key.

Oh, really?

I'll often get terrorists mixed up with crabs.

I can never remember.

Are crabs the ones who hate female crabs wearing mini skirts?

I'll get them mixed up.

I think so.

So this is Bugle 78.

So this issue of the Bugle is being specially issued as a 78 RPM audio vinyl podcast.

Meaning

you will only find it funny if you listen to it while standing on a turntable, rotating once every 0.76 seconds.

I hope we've got your anti-dizzy headphones on.

78 also of course is the number of chromosomes in canine DNA, meaning that if you play all 78 bugles simultaneously, it will sound like a pack of dogs barking.

And also,

78, John, is the total number of gifts given in the hit Carol The 12 Days of Christmas.

But this year, of course, you can cut out the inappropriately extravagant outlay, the cruelty to birds, and the kidnap of a total of 140 innocent men and women required to give all the gifts in that song, and instead give your true love 12 issues of the bugle, 11 more issues of the bugle, 10 more issues of the bugle, etc., Until he or she tells you to f right off.

Top story this week, Democrapalooza 09.

There has been a democracy extravaganza in the world this week, Andy, and it just shows that the Iraqi war has been a huge success.

I mean, yes, those two aren't connected, but I think we'd all feel a lot better if they were.

So let's just give ourselves that one for now, shall we?

Yeah.

Europe, Andy, has staged the biggest multi-state election in human history, and the citizens of Europe responded to that calling by either not voting or voting like complete assholes.

Turnout was a massive, scarcely worth the effort of staging it 43%,

the lowest since direct elections began 30 years ago, and the biggest gains were for centre-right, far-right and anti-immigration parties.

Oh

that sound you just heard was the sound of ancient Greeks groaning in their graves saying no you've got it all wrong.

That is not what we meant by democracy.

And while we're at it, what the f have you done to the Olympics?

That's supposed to be a celebration of naked men running around and wrestling each other.

What the shit is a decathlon?

Yeah, when you would have thought, John, if there was one f ⁇ ing continent that should know the dangers of lurching to the right politically, it would be f ⁇ ing Europe.

Well, especially during the time of an economic meltdown.

Exactly, yeah.

It's fine.

It's never happened before, Andy.

I don't know what president you're referring to.

No one should be concerned that Europe is lurching rightwards in this time of global economic crisis.

There was some heartbreaking, soul-destroying, and mind-blowing news from the BNP, the British National Party, who you may remember we described a few bugles ago as

that that bleep you just heard being the biggest bleep there is in the English language.

Well, do you know what, Andy?

I've had a few weeks to think on this.

And

with the events of the recent week, it actually turns out that they're even bigger than we gave them credit for.

What makes you say that, John?

The things they've said and done over the last seven days.

Those are the classic giveaways, aren't they?

I mean, that's, yeah, I've got pretty big dar, and it was really bleeping pretty strongly this week.

They won two seats, their first ever victories in a nationwide election.

And when asked by a journalist, well, how do you know if someone is British or not, truly British, Nick Griffin, the head of the BNP in a monstrous dick splash, said

you just look at them.

You just know.

Which would seem to be a quintessential piece of racism for that racist to say.

But he contested that point saying, no, it wasn't just about the colour of their skin.

You could also tell by other things such as their behaviour and their families.

So, also the colour of their family skin then.

Oh, that's that's much less racist.

That's racism once removed.

I'm sorry, Nick, we got you all wrong.

The BNP, as you said, they gained six per cent of the votes as a whole and two seats in the EU Parliament, which no doubt they will use for their traditional hobby of acting like total dicks whenever they think anyone is paying attention.

Thankfully, though, John, the BNP do remain at the moment a small and very stupid minority, albeit one with almost a million voters, which frankly is a massive indictment of the British education system.

So please, government, send out some history books to these people.

They have to learn.

It wasn't all doom and gloom, though, John, because on Tuesday, Nick Griffin, a man who looks quite like a man who wishes he'd been born 70 years earlier in a country a bit southeast of here, was prevented from holding a press conference in Westminster when he was pelted with eggs by demonstrators.

Good.

Before scurrying off like a rat.

Now, these demonstrators promised that they would turn up to every public appearance that he makes.

And this is democracy.

This is how democracy should work.

Griffin described it as a sad, sad day for British democracy.

And much as it was magnificent to see members of the British public use the produce of a chicken's minge to make their yoki point on the BNP leader, it was slightly sad, I guess, to see an elected representative, which Griffin now is, not stand there and take the full-body omeletting that he clearly deserves.

I would absolutely encourage any buglers who have ever seen Nick Griffin to quickly find yourself an egg and throw throw it at him because he deserves it, and there is no better way for an egg to be used.

Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, who didn't have a great time at the elections, he's recently taken the kind of battering usually reserved for a particularly succulent piece of haddock.

But he managed to cling on to power despite a spectacularly appalling display in the elections.

Labour hauled in a pitiful 16% of those who voted, and bearing in mind that Britain, as feverishly devoted to democracy as ever, managed to clock up a 34% turnout.

The government amassed around 5%

of the available votes.

And several opposition politicians said that in these elections, looking at the government's results, the public couldn't have spoken any more clearly.

And this is true.

And what the British public has said is, we fing hate politics.

But if the message could be inferred that they want the government out, the problem is that it could also be inferred that they don't want anyone else in.

So I think we could be heading for an age of anarchy, John, with the Queen just standing on top of Buckingham Palace saying, please, everyone, calm down.

Obviously, Annie, it's weeks like this that can start to make you despair and lose your faith in humanity a bit which is where Sweden stepped in because their surprise game was the Swedish Pirate Party.

Now that wasn't pirates opting to abandon pillage on the high seas instead deciding to engage in the political process and wasn't that what we were all trying with them for centuries ago you know just try and get them to the table convincing they could achieve all they wanted to through legislation and therefore catch scurvy a lot less.

But no, instead this was a pirate pirate party campaigning for free internet downloads of music and films and it received 7% of the vote.

You know that your country is basically doing pretty well if 7% of your citizens are willing to vote on a single issue of internet copyright.

That is a rich nation's problem.

There was a young drunk Swede on the news here who explained his voting for the Pirate Party by saying, I just want free videos.

And it's a good point he makes, Andy.

I don't doubt that he wants free videos.

It would be great if we could all have free videos.

The problem is, Andy, that he can't have free videos because video companies need to recoup at least their video production costs somehow.

And if he keeps stealing videos, there will eventually be no videos left to steal.

His policy on videos is extremely short-sighted.

I think you can probably gather from this just how funny I find the word videos.

And next week, in accents John finds funny, it's the Japanese.

Elsewhere in Europe, there are also notable games, not just by the far-right wingers, but also by environmentalists.

So I guess looking at these two results in concurrence, John, the conclusion you can draw is that if you want to be a bigot, you need a planet to be a bigot on.

True.

Iranian election now, and Iran claims that it is the most democratic nation in the Middle East, which is is probably a bit like saying you're the least racist person at a Klan rally, but you know, they may still be right, you know, credit where it's due.

Iran is a governing mixture between democracy and theocracy.

And what a great mixture that is.

That is like mixing orange juice and milk.

They might work separately, but put them in a glass together and you've got one unpalatable mess.

It's currently underway at the election.

They're voting literally as we speak.

And bugle favourite whack job, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is facing serious competition from opposing presidential candidate Mur Hussain Mousavi and reports are coming in right now of an unprecedented turnout in Iran.

Interest has spiked in the campaign after a very fractious TV debate.

It was like boxers getting into a fight during the weigh-in.

You can't help but feel it was slightly contrived to increase the audience, but you can't deny that it was effective.

Yep, this I don't know how to break this to you buglers, but this could be the end for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The little man with the big mouth is right up against it.

It being the will of the Iranian electorates, according to the latest opinion polls.

So he could well be packing his bags, popping his bluffers-guided nuclear weapons in his knapsack, giving one last cuddle to his little toy Israel that he used to practice his speeches on, and handing over the keys to Iran to someone a bit less gobby.

And I guess from a selfish point of view, John, from our point of view, would be quite a shame if Ahmadinejad goes.

I can't imagine a more moderate successor.

It will have quite the same knack of pulling out entertainingly left-field swipes at the rest of the world.

There was literally no subject on which Ahmadinejad couldn't turn to having a pop at Israel or America.

I remember just a couple of years ago, Johnny, was the BBC's guest encores commentator during the Open Golf.

And Peter Alice said to him, so Mahmoud, it looks like Tiger's found a nasty bit of rough there.

And Armandinejad replies, that's right, Peter.

He's going to have to play safe here.

Just pop it back onto the fairway and take his medicine, I think.

But if I was in his situation, I'd probably get my eight iron out and try to wreak the destruction of the fascistic Zionist boil on the face of humanity that is the state of Israel.

But no, no, it looks like like Tiger's going to use the five-iron and take a look at the green.

Bold stuff for the world number one, the American shit bag.

Over now to Ken Brown at the 12th.

In a major change, Mousavi's wife has been out on the campaign trail with him.

And he has said that if elected, he will review laws that discriminate against women.

That's quite a lot of laws to review there, Mousavi.

That may prove to be a bigger job than you want to acknowledge.

Patrols of morality police regularly enforce standards of dress on Iran's streets.

And that's not fashion police, as in that tie doesn't go with those shoes or you're wearing stripes with stripes.

What are you thinking?

This is a literal fashion police stopping women in the street and charging them with inappropriate dress laws.

You should send the Iranian fashion police to the streets of Newcastle on a Friday night.

Get things in perspective a bit for them.

Shock them into their senses.

I think you and me, we could probably do with something like that.

We could deal with a state telling us how to dress.

But I guess, you know, official state fashion was not everyone's cup of tea.

I mean, that really is taking the nanny state too far, isn't it?

Put this on you or you're not going out.

Can't we have Mary Poppins back?

Apparently, the country is more divided than at any time since the revolution.

And it is never a good sign when you're comparing unrest levels to a period just before a major revolution.

There does seem a real possibility that Ahmadinejad may lose this election.

Part of his concern is one of demographics.

Iran is a young country, 60% of the population are under 30.

And it's perhaps because of this that Ahmadinejad has been using Obama's yes we can slogan

to inspire voters so he's not only an anti-Semite Andy he's also a plagiarist yeah Ahmadinejad's supporters themselves are still fanatical now as he left one rally this week one woman apparently approached him asking him to cure her child What's he been telling the Iranian people?

And he's the David Copperfield of Middle Eastern politics, by which I mean he's slightly magical, charismatic, and deeply creepy.

Mousavi is more of a women fan than

in the political sense, John.

Calm down, lawyers.

He's happily married to a former university chancellor, artist, writer, and political scientist called Zahra Ranavad.

She sounds like she could hold her own in a conversation, John.

Mousavi is also the president of the Iranian Academy of Arts, and he and his wife are both keen painters.

So if he does unseat Ahmadinejad, Iran would be going very much from oil-based economy to oil-based paints, from brushes with America to brushes with genuine sable hair bristles, from on-garde to avant-garde, from dada to dada, from pointed schisms to pointilism, from real dick to surreal pick, from ease off to easel.

Unplug me, Tom, it's got to end.

In the last days of the campaign, Ahmadinejad was in an especially fiery mood, which is, I guess, like saying that an inferno is being extra fiery.

Even at its least fiery, it's still an inferno.

He said of the opponents attacking him that such insults and accusations against the government are a return to Hitler's methods to repeat lies and accusations until everyone believes those lies.

Just to put this Hitler slur in context, this is coming from a man who denies the Holocaust.

I think he loses the right to use the Hitler insults, Andy.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, John, have shown that they perhaps still haven't quite got the hang of democracy by warning that any attempted popular revolution would be crushed.

I guess it's a policy of sorts.

That's democracy.

You know, if people are opposed to it, they just need to vote the government back in.

Now it's time for a multiple-choice Iranian election competition question.

And the question is this: Ahmadina Jadutis' final TV appearance of the campaign to accuse his opponents of conspiring with which country to try to discredit him.

Can you guess?

Was it A, the cricket-loving Caribbean island nation of Antigua and Barbuda?

Was it B, the sparsely populated desert-based south-west African country of Namibia?

C, the tiny peace-loving alpine mountain tax haven state of Liechtenstein?

Or D, Israel?

Think about it for a bit.

Pens down, the answer was C, Liechtenstein.

Then he had a good laugh with the guy who played a prank on his teleprompter, re-recorded it, and went with D, Israel.

So if you've got the question right, you have won the chance to apply for a seat in the new Iranian cabinet as Minister for Carhorn Honking.

In fact, Ahmadinejad, Andy, is so concerned about losing this election that he spent his time recently handing out free potatoes to the poor in an attempt to get them to vote for him.

Potatoes for votes, Andy, is the new political sleaze.

Surely the poor would want something a bit more exciting than a potato though, Joe.

You're just giving them their staple diet.

I don't know, Andy.

The government has been handing out 400,000 tons of free spuds.

Here's the incredible thing.

The situation got so bad with this that his political opponents during rallies have apparently started chanting death to potatoes.

That just doesn't have the same ring to it as death to America, Andy.

But you know, I suppose at least it's a move in the right direction.

They have to blame something for how bad their lives are.

Why not point the finger at the potato?

Death to potatoes!

They're at best an accompaniment in a meal.

Death to potatoes!

On their own terms, they are completely tasteless.

One thing that Ahmedijad's opponents have been using against him has been a YouTube clip, and he's been ridiculed in this clip for being crazy.

I don't know, it seems a bit late in the day to be calling him crazy now, Andy.

I don't think he's ever lied about his mad levels.

In this YouTube clip, he was talking about a speech he gave to to the UN in 2005.

And he said, and I quote, a member of the Iranian delegation told me, I saw a light that surrounded you.

I sensed it myself too.

I felt the atmosphere change.

All the leaders in the audience didn't blink for 27, 28 minutes.

I'm not exaggerating when I'm saying they didn't blink.

Everybody had been astonished.

They'd opened their eyes and ears to see what is the message from the Islamic Republic.

Come on, you know what you're getting with him.

He puts all his crazy potatoes on the table.

And that is some classic Mahmood right there.

They didn't blink for 28 minutes.

I'm not exaggerating.

Well, I suppose he isn't really exaggerating because for that to be the case, he'd need to be operating from at least a grain of truth.

What he's doing is just making shit up.

For the sake of balance, if any buglers are considering voting in the Iranian election, here are the other candidates running.

Mohsen Rezai, the former head of the Revolutionary Guards.

Mehdi Karoubi, who has pledged to take the middle path in Iran.

And then, of course, there are the fringe candidates, Amjad Kasumi of the Iranian Carrot Party, running on a Carrots for Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner ticket.

Very much an outsider, but maybe he could take on this potato policy of Ahmadinejad.

Farzad, the human snookable Nazarami of the Persian Circus Party, a radical Islamist and acrobat.

Bebop Alula Shesma Baibi, Iranians with names that sound like 1950s rock and roll lyrics party.

And Loopy Loop screeching Jalal Banguri and the Toastmaster of Tehran from the Iranian branch of the Monster Raving Looney Party.

And finally, of course, Derek Jeta of the New York Yankees.

Bit of a surprise for Jeter, that one.

I think a couple of factors got mixed up, and he's running in the Iranian election, whilst hardline cleric Hossein Al-Kaboodle has been playing shortstop for the Bronx bombers.

Bugle feature section now, and this week's feature section is great moments in history that happened 150 years ago to the day.

On the 15th of June, 1859, John, almost exactly 150 years ago, give or take the odd second, Britain and America went to war about a pig The total casualties of this war won the pig It was known as the pig war less of a war more of a preparation for a barbecue just to interrupt before you go on here this is going to sound

like something you've made up.

I realize Andy has has been a bullshit crop sprayer

Throughout the history of these 78 bugles.

This is actually a historic fact and you can look that up.

It's not something that Andy has also managed to release previously on the internet to back up his bullshit claims.

This actually happened.

Andy, please carry on.

Well, it all kicked off, John, on the disputed island of San Juan between Vancouver Island and mainland North America, when an American farmer called Cutler found a pig on his land, scoffing its chops, rooting around, and generally being a pig.

A man standing by a fence laughed, apparently.

Cutler got the hump and shot the pig.

Bang, oink, splat.

Uh-oh, looks like war.

Well, the owner of the pig was an Irish cat named Griffin, and he was a bit narked off about his pig being shot.

He went up to Cutler, and Cutler said, Oops, mate, I shot your pig.

And Griffin responded, Yes, mate, you shot my fing pig.

Cutler responded, Yep.

How about I give you ten bucks and we call it quits?

Griffin shook his head.

Hundred and I'll think about it.

Hundred bucks for a dead pig?

No, hundred bucks for shooting a live pig.

No, I'm not paying that, said Cutler.

The pig-faced little bastard was trespassing on my land.

Got off lightly, if you ask me.

Got off lightly?

He's dead.

Now he's just sausages in waiting.

Well, said Cutler, he was eating my potatoes.

Well, said Griffin, it's up to you to keep your potatoes out of my pig.

Well, that's a direct quality.

That is a direct quig.

It sounds like something you've made up.

That is a great argument.

Up to you to keep your potatoes out of my pig.

So Cutler presumably responded, Well, I told my potatoes not to go in the pig.

And Griffin hit back, well, you clearly didn't tell them clearly enough.

Well, maybe you should have told your pig not to let my potatoes into its fat mouth.

Right, blasted Griffin, mustache quivering with porcine fury.

I've had enough of this.

I'm calling the police.

Right, said Cutler.

Well, I'm calling the army.

Yeah, said Griffin.

Well, I'm calling the police, the army, and the navy.

And Cutler responded, well, I'm calling the police, the army, the navy, and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

We'll have a job getting here in time.

Yeah, well, I'm calling them anyway.

They don't exist yet.

Ack ack, akack.

It's war, mate.

It's war.

So anyway, one thing led to another, and a few weeks later, there were 460 American soldiers with 14 cannons facing off against five British warships with 70 guns and 2,100 men because of a dead pig.

The Governor of Vancouver Island ordered the British Admiral in charge to attack.

Now, the Admiral said, I think that might be a bit foolish, Governor.

It's a pig we're talking about.

And the Governor replied, Yeah, it's a pig today, but next time they'll be hoisting Queen Victoria's head on a big American spike before using it as a football.

The Admiral hit back, no, they won't, it's the wrong shape.

It's not round enough to play football with.

Well, then, they'll probably invent some new form of football with a more head-shaped ball just to have an excuse for chopping Her Majesty's nut off.

All right, Governor, put your sword away and get back in your bath.

For two nations to go to war over a squabble about a pig would be very much eating from the silly side of the pizza, said the Admiral.

Oh, bollocks.

I wanted to go down in history as the governor who sparked a cataclysmic global conflict and the end of humanity that all started with a greedy pig eating some spuds.

Could just insult them instead if you want, said the admiral.

I suppose that'll do, said the governor.

But I want us to throw some good stuff at them.

I want our boys to call them

arse wipes, shit buckets, mongoose humpers, and imperial strength twat faces.

Right, oh boss I'll get them to it.

So for some days the soldiers on both sides who'd been instructed not to fire shots at each other instead hurled insults at each other.

What a war John.

How much nicer would the First World War have been with swearing instead of bullets?

That would have been great.

English and the Germans just trash talking.

Your mama jokes.

Soaring across the trenches.

It would have essentially had the same end result.

Britain would have just had that fractionally deeper resource of insults than Germany.

So for some days they hurled insults at each other.

Then as inevitably happens when someone's pig gets shot by a farmer, the American president became involved.

Despite this, peace broke out and a deal was reached where the two countries shared the island.

Until in 1872, the German Kaiser Wilhelm I was called upon to resolve once and for all whose island it was.

He plumped for America.

Britain was not pleased and in revenge allowed international relations to develop in such a way over the next 42 years that Germany was goaded into starting two world wars that almost destroyed humanity.

All because of a fing pig.

Surprising amount of that was fact, John.

A very surprising amount.

Greatest war ever fought.

Your emails now, and this one comes from Dave Anderson.

And Dave writes on the subject of my signal booster delivery.

He writes, Andy, I'm hoping that you've received your wireless modem booster, but I'm confused as to why you would offer your prayers to Zeus for your delivery.

Surely your prayers would have been better offered to Hermes.

I can see the connection between Zeus, all-powerful son of Kronos, and the electronic nature of the device, but the problem was more to do with location and movement, which would probably fall to Hermes, the god of commerce and trade.

Furthermore, what sort of sacrifice did you offer to Zeus, who gathers the clouds?

He isn't like the Nambi-Pambi milk-toast gods you get nowadays.

You know, the ones that work in mysterious ways, quotes.

No, Zeus, lord of the Aegis, worked in pretty clear ways and demanded a little something in return for his help.

You're lucky he didn't turn your son into a goat, or visit you as a golden shower like he did when he sighed Perseus.

I'm quite thankful for that.

If Agamemnon could offer up Iphigenar as a snack to Artemis, surely you could have offered up John to Zeus.

Am I wrong?

Oh, I guess we could, you know, sacrifice one or other of us, or maybe Tom.

I'm willing to take a hit for the team.

Yeah, to ensure, and maybe it'll help circulation figures.

Would you get more listeners if we have a life sacrifice?

Well, I'm nearly dead anyway at the moment.

Tom's feeling a bit peaky.

Let's just

save the truth.

Tom, you're on the precipice of death.

We might as well give you that final shove.

It's an act of kindness.

It's a mercy killing.

Okay, okay so that's motion carried yeah we'll do it there you go i'll bring in my chainsaw super piece of pedantry there oh we had another uh email from mauricio althekasia uh now we asked uh last week if you'd let us know what you were doing so so we could check you were safe he said dear john and andy i'm off to invade sark if you don't hear from me in the next couple of days feel free to invade it yourselves ending wee

well mauricio we didn't hear from you a couple of days after that so uh yeah i guess that's open season someone else can go and invade that unruly pakistani region region now.

Sark.

Sark's in the Channel Islands.

I'm sorry, the Sark's the Channel Islands.

I thought he meant the area filled with the Taliban that they were trying to pull down in Baker.

That's the Swat Valley.

Sark is a small island in the English Channel, John.

I mean, it's possible that Pakistan may have invaded it and it not got on the news.

It's not really much of a hook for the British media, I guess.

I hope he hasn't been killed by the Sark natives.

Mauricio, if you're fighting and running battle and you need backup, just let us know.

Probably quite a tough logistical challenge to conquer an island like that on your own.

Probably got lookout posts at all corners, so it's quite a small island, so therefore easily defensible.

And I imagine Mauritio doesn't have much aerial firepower, which I think if you're going to try and take an island like that, you'd probably need to soften it up for a couple of weeks beforehand.

Fair play for trying, though.

We've had some excellent emails this week.

It should certainly be rounded up in this week's Bugle blog.

Unfortunately, for the last four weeks, the Bugle blog has been taken down as soon as it's gone up.

Tom, what's been going on there?

Because I've been writing these things, I've been putting them up, they're just disappearing straight away.

I have very, very high standards when it comes to blogs.

I'm afraid at the moment they just don't meet the required standards.

Take that.

There's been a lot of people complaining about the lack of blogs.

Well, I don't see a lot of people posting their own blogs about it.

What are you talking about?

Don't point the finger at anyone else, Andy.

You promised something and then you didn't deliver.

If you never promised a blog, there wouldn't be this issue.

That's just my typing finger.

I got a tweak in the knuckle.

You know what I mean?

I'm going around saying, oh,

I promise I'll give you a blog next week, Buglers, because I don't want to let them down because I care about their feelings, Andy.

Why don't you care about their feelings as much?

Do you just love the idea of building people up to dash their hopes?

Yep.

Fair enough.

Fair enough.

At least you own it.

That's right.

That's why I've had children.

If Andy doesn't do a blog soon, I'm going to write one detailing all the excuses he's given me over the past few weeks.

It's my typing knuckle.

It's got a little twinge from typing.

There you go, because there's one to add to the list.

Excuse 122.

How's your kitchen getting on, Andy?

Because this had better be the best kitchen ever built.

Well, it's all right.

Yeah, it's got to be a pretty good kitchen.

It's unconventional, certainly.

Who has a jacuzzi in a kitchen?

Exactly.

Who's got a fully working Spitfire in a kitchen?

We could have had an oven, but no, we've got a World War II fight.

It's certainly a talking point.

You can't have anything cooked, but we can put a carrot through the propeller.

We've had some excellent emails, including a masterwork about Delante West that

will definitely be in the blog.

Definitely be in the blog.

A really excellent from a man who described himself as the Malcolm Gladwell of bullshit.

Oh, that's a good title.

Oh, Gladwell's not going to be happy with that.

I think Gladwell's the Gladwell of bullshit.

So do keep your emails flooding in to thebugle at timesonline.co.uk.

Bugle sport now, and well, there were rumours going around that last Friday, in fact, just after we recorded last week's Bugle 77, there were rumours going around on the internet that England had lost to Holland at cricket.

It's become quite a widespread rumour on the internet.

A lot of quite well-respected news and sports sites have run with this as a fact, but in fact, it was a hoax.

It didn't happen.

It was a hoax propagated by the enemies of this country.

There is absolutely no way that England could ever lose to Holland at cricket.

It was a clear forgery, John.

Are you sure you're not behaving like the David Irving of cricket history here, aren't they?

I'm an England losing to Holland denier.

Exactly.

I mean, it did happen.

I had to check on the the news that it had happened.

And also that the world hadn't ended.

Because I think it's from the Bible, it's one of the signs of the apocalypse.

Isn't it kind of pestilence, famine, war, and England losing to Holland at cricket?

I just like to say that I was just looking at the BBC Sport website now and there's a live commentary from Queen's Club of Murray versus Fish.

Well, you know, I was just laughing at the name Fish.

Andy Murray's

playing tennis against a fish.

Well, so he gives him a battering.

There you go, two battering jokes in one show.

So the bugle forecast this week is who is going to write the next blog?

Is it going to be me?

Is it going to be Tom?

Or you?

Is it going to be you, John?

No, it's going to be you.

It's not going to be me.

It's not going to be me, Andy.

Because I'm honest about the fact that I'm going to be aware of it.

I'm going to talk with your celebrity friends.

What, Snoop Dogg?

You've got a problem with me, Andy.

You've got a problem with Snoop Dogg.

Well,

I'm gonna ask if I can become what I need to do to become an official member of the dog pound.

I don't know whether it's, you know, you've got to pass some kind of test.

You just got a piss on a lamppost, haven't you?

Done and done.

Drag your ass across the carpet.

That's how you got the daily show job, wasn't it?

That's it from the bugle this week.

There'll be more next week.

Do keep your emails cascading into the bugle at timesonline.co.uk.

Bye-bye for now.

Bye.

Vote on the dinner, Jan.

This is a Times Online podcast.

For more podcasts, go to timesonline.co.uk forward slash podcasts.

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.