Warships of the Caribbean - With John Oliver

Speaker 1 The Supreme Court building is getting a f ⁇ ing makeup for this year.

Speaker 1 There is a non-zero chance that that place has a stripper pole and an all-you-can-eat buffet before the end of this calendar year.

Speaker 2 The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.

Speaker 3 Hello buglers and welcome to issue 4358 of the Bugle the World's leading and only audio newspaper for a visual world and this is a very special issue before we start it though a quick alert to our Australian listeners or indeed anyone who's going to be in Australia from late November to early January.

Speaker 3 I am heading your way. There will be live bugles in Brisbane on the 2nd of December with Alice Fraser and Melbourne on the 22nd of December with Lloyd Langford.

Speaker 3 Also I'll be doing my stand-up show the Zoltgeist Special Australia Edition in Perth on the 26th of November, Brisbane on the 3rd of December, Adelaide on the 14th, Melbourne on the 23rd of December, and Sydney on the 2nd of January.

Speaker 3 I then have UK dates from the 31st of January through to May, a fully updated version of the Zoltgeist entitled The Zoltgeist, a Second Thwack. All details on my website, handyzoltzman.co.uk.

Speaker 3 But now, well, almost now, to this week's Bugle. After this message from our sponsors, who are the Bugle podcast.

Speaker 3 There are official limited edition christmas jumpers stroke sweaters deletes according to preference now on sale via the website they are very limited edition when this batch is gone they will be gone for all time so to improve your christmas stroke tanuka stroke kwanza stroke decembral festivitatas go to thebuglepodcast.com and buy yourself the ultimate in a time tense fashion accessory of the year but now and i really mean it this time to issue uh 4358 of the bugle i promise you something special and it does not get more special than this if you like a the bugle b the the passage of time, C the number 18 and D a live show featuring via transoceanic video call a true blast from the Bugles Long Past.

Speaker 3 This is taken from the first half of the Bugle's 18th birthday live live stream show live on Sunday the 26th of October at the Leicester Square Theatre in London.

Speaker 2 Please welcome to the stage Andy's off birth!

Speaker 2 Hello Buglers!

Speaker 2 Welcome to the Bugle 18th birthday live stream live here live from London's glamorous London district. We are

Speaker 2 I'm fine, thanks for asking.

Speaker 2 How are you?

Speaker 2 Are you ready for whatever slightly ramshackle collection of things and technological glitches take place over the next couple of hours?

Speaker 2 Give me an X.

Speaker 2 V.

Speaker 2 Give me an I.

Speaker 2 Give me another I.

Speaker 2 Give me one final I.

Speaker 2 What have you got?

Speaker 2 Very good. You've done.
Very well trained crowds.

Speaker 2 Without further ado, a man who needs no introduction, but who is going to get an introduction nonetheless.

Speaker 2 Someone who is currently lagging over 350 episodes behind all-time leader Andy Zoltzman in the highly prestigious Most Episodes of the Bugle co-hosted.

Speaker 2 Stumbling slowly towards 300.

Speaker 2 It's a man who cannot open his toilet door these days without tripping over a fing Emmy statue, but who crucially has never once been nominated as Sports Data Journalist of the Year.

Speaker 2 So who's the winner here?

Speaker 2 Let's call it one-all. A survivor of the love guru and Smurfs 2.

Speaker 2 The man best known as the guy who used to do a podcast with Andy's Altiman

Speaker 2 all the way from his well-earned exile in New York City. It's the one and only, actually, there's probably quite a few of them.
John Oliver!

Speaker 2 Hello!

Speaker 2 There we go.

Speaker 2 Judas, thank you very much.

Speaker 2 Yeah, people hate to know when you went electric, John.

Speaker 2 Welcome to your first ever

Speaker 2 live bugle.

Speaker 2 Hello, Angie.

Speaker 1 Hello, buglers. This brings back so many memories.
I remember distinctly the day the bugle was born, so clearly, born, kicking and screaming right into the loving arms of Rupert Murdoch's Times News

Speaker 1 and only when we realized that Rupert was probably going to be an unfit co-parent and not tolerant of the bugle's tantrums did we decide to bust it out and raise it on our own and here we are things have changed so much Andy in the last 18 years.

Speaker 1 18 years ago, I barely knew what a podcast was. And now it seems all presidential candidates have to go on at least 20 of them to be taken seriously.

Speaker 1 The road to the White House currently runs right through Joe Rogan.

Speaker 1 And you have to sit there while he promotes athletic greens. Is that a good thing? I don't think so, but it's the world we live in now.

Speaker 1 Andy, this year, Benjamin Netanyahu went on the Nelk Boys podcast.

Speaker 1 He went on the Nelk Boys. He was interviewed by the Nelk Boys, and at one point they said to Netanyahu, you like, I quote, you like Burger.

Speaker 1 Over McDonald's, that's your worst take. It's not his worst take, Andy.

Speaker 1 Podcasts have officially gone out of hand now, and I think you are partly responsible for for that.

Speaker 2 So, John, I mean, you did

Speaker 2 eight years, almost 300 episodes of the bugle, then you had to stop doing it in 2015. And no one knows why.
The rumours I've heard,

Speaker 2 one is that you had to settle down and get a regular nine-to-five gig,

Speaker 2 two is that you wanted to try and make it as a professional line dancer,

Speaker 2 and the other was that you insisted on being 10% louder than me in the bugle, and Chris said no. So,

Speaker 2 can you confirm why it was that

Speaker 2 you left or not?

Speaker 1 Well, Andy, you know, I just wanted to see you spread your wings and fly, you know, like a bird right into a windmill.

Speaker 2 That's what I wanted.

Speaker 2 And in terms of, you know, how your decision to leave the bugle has worked out for the world, John, since you left in 2015, John, Donald Trump has won not one, not three, but two presidential elections.

Speaker 1 He would dispute that, Andy. He would say he won.

Speaker 2 I think you're right.

Speaker 2 Brexit happened.

Speaker 2 Boris Johnson,

Speaker 2 God rest his soul,

Speaker 2 if it is ever located. He

Speaker 2 briefly became Prime Minister. There are more wars around the world than I've had hot dinners today, which is quite a lot of hot dinners, to be honest.

Speaker 2 The pangs of guilt must be a daily burden for you, John.

Speaker 1 Well, I just don't think that cause-effect stands up, Andy.

Speaker 1 I have to believe that, you know, a butterfly didn't beat its wings and then Brexit happened and then turned the world upside down. I will say, I don't like the tone of your voice, Andy.

Speaker 1 America is still the greatest country in the world. It is still a shining city on a hill, even if it is on fire.
You can still shine when you're on fire. This is the shining, smoking city on a hill.

Speaker 2 I've got a note here from my researcher. Are you back? Did you just get get back from the Riyadh Comedy Festival or couldn't I couldn't I

Speaker 1 oh you know Andy it's very important to uh bring jokes uh to the Saudi royal family I think all comedians know there's nothing funnier than taking Saudi royal family money at the end of the day it's the long game they just haven't got to the big punchline yet

Speaker 2 so uh well for our sort of anniversary this week it's about 18 18 years the bugle is 18 can you be different the bugle is 18 John the Bugle is now old old enough to to vote legally

Speaker 2 it's long since been old enough to vote if it gave a shit

Speaker 2 old enough to buy a drink legally or in America to buy a drink legally if it's got fake ID

Speaker 2 old enough to drive a submarine into an aquarium and release all the turtles

Speaker 2 old enough to become an unlicensed vicar and march on Rome to declare itself the one true pope I mean

Speaker 2 these are exciting times for the bugle John. Old enough to buy enough firearms to start a well-regulated militia in any standard grocery store

Speaker 2 in the USA. And old enough to do an 18th birthday special without people saying it's a bit early to be doing that, isn't it? So we've made it to.

Speaker 2 We've made it to.

Speaker 1 Isn't it old enough to get a tattoo as well, Andy, and to be criminally tried as an adult?

Speaker 2 Well, too late for the first one, and fingers crossed on the second.

Speaker 2 As always, buglers, one section of this audio newspaper is going, where?

Speaker 2 I can't hear you, it's going, where?

Speaker 2 I could hear you the first time, clearly.

Speaker 1 Andy, you're like a 1980s game show hogs without the segments.

Speaker 2 It's what I always dreamed of being, John.

Speaker 2 Not that kind.

Speaker 2 Family show.

Speaker 2 I don't usually have to say that to the audience.

Speaker 2 I usually have to say that to one of our guests who's joining us later.

Speaker 2 So for our sex and men, we're going to compare 2007, the year the bugle started, with 2025. I mean,

Speaker 2 do you think the world's improved

Speaker 2 since 2007 or got worse, John?

Speaker 1 Well, in what way? It depends what you think the word improved means.

Speaker 1 In the traditional sense, sure, it's got worse, but you know,

Speaker 1 if you're a fan of really steering into the skid, the world has definitely done that, hasn't it?

Speaker 2 What about you? Give us a cheer if you think things have got better.

Speaker 2 Right.

Speaker 2 One thing that has got better is pessimism, which

Speaker 2 I think is just so much more effective.

Speaker 2 It's proved right so much on you know, it's it's stats, John,

Speaker 2 off the scale,

Speaker 2 pessimism these days. And well, statistics, as we we know, are like a comedian who's just done the Riyadh Comedy Festival.
And if you treat them right, I'll say whatever the f you want.

Speaker 2 But if we look back to 2007, historically, it was a simpler planet in 2007. People lived simple, happy lives, eating simple, happy foods, hunting with simple, happy, flint-tipped spears.

Speaker 2 The boredom was interrupted only by the odd family day out to go to your local henge to see if it was midsummer or not.

Speaker 2 And maybe look at some amusingly shaped sticks or laugh at how overgrown granddad's burial mound had got or in other parts of the world build a massive fing pyramid to make sure the dead stayed dead or arcsing.

Speaker 2 Oh sorry, I've done BC instead of AD.

Speaker 2 Better move on.

Speaker 2 We've had some birthday messages to the bugle, John.

Speaker 2 Yep.

Speaker 2 Happy birthday, Bugle. Can't believe it's 18 years already.
Mind you, time does fly if like me you've been dead since the year 1910.

Speaker 2 You guys were true pioneers of audio newspapers for visual worlds, like I was of battlefield nursing back in the day.

Speaker 2 Andy, thanks for the flowers. Oh, shit.

Speaker 2 Sorry about the mix-up, Ray Dinner. Maybe another time if I ever manage to nurse myself back to life.

Speaker 2 Love from Florence.

Speaker 2 My wife wife is in this show.

Speaker 2 Another birthday message, John. Well done on lasting longer than I did.
If you ever find yourself having a metal rod shoved up your Watset, you'll know it's time to quit. Guess I kind of deserved it.

Speaker 2 Love from Colonel M. Gaddafi.

Speaker 2 AKA the human lollipop.

Speaker 2 And this congrats, dudes, as one of your OG listeners,

Speaker 2 I think of the bugle as the greatest legacy of my 23 decades controlling global news media. Well done, and thanks for sending me all that Virgin's blood to keep me alive for all eternity.

Speaker 2 Lots of love, Uncle Rupert. So

Speaker 2 actually, the jokes on him is not actually Virgin's blood, it's supermarket tomato ketchup

Speaker 2 mixed with water from the Thames. But amazingly, it works exactly the same.
Would you believe it?

Speaker 2 So, anyway, that section is in the pen.

Speaker 2 Top story this week, White House Down.

Speaker 2 John, I know White House Down is one of the few films you've not appeared in.

Speaker 2 But I mean, what a time for America. The White House, the symbol of American independence, democracy, and power, has been brutally attacked.

Speaker 2 Some are proclaiming it to be an inside job, possibly going right to the very top.

Speaker 2 You've been Britain's foremost shallow cover Secret Service agent in the U.S.

Speaker 2 since 2006. This brutal assault, taking down one of America's most treasured buildings, must have spread fear into the hearts of all true Americans, such as yourself, John.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I mean, if I may quote the words of Miley Cyrus, Andy, and I think I may.

Speaker 1 Trump's coming like a wreck in ball.

Speaker 1 The East Wing has completely gone.

Speaker 1 All he wanted was to break some walls. Now he's gone and f ⁇ ing wrecked it.

Speaker 2 Andy, Donald Trump.

Speaker 2 Don't encourage him. Do not encourage him.
You are enabling this.

Speaker 1 Donald Trump, Andy is many things, a businessman, a TV host, a felon, and

Speaker 1 a guest actor in many shows, including, and this is true, Suddenly Susan and the Fresh Prince of Bel Air.

Speaker 1 I think he was the only president to appear in the Fresh Prince of Bel Air other than Jimmy Carter, who, if I remember rightly,

Speaker 1 once asked Ashley Banks, played by Tatian Ali, to the school dance only to get a fight with Geoffrey the Butler. I could be misrepresenting that, so I don't think I am.

Speaker 1 He's also famously a two-time president and a builder, and it's those last two jobs that really came together this week when he demolished the entire East Wing of the White House.

Speaker 1 It is still an incredible sentence to say out loud. It doesn't feel real, even though the East Wing of the White House is literally gone.
The White House, Andy, is 80% ruffled right now.

Speaker 1 And I'll be honest, I generally don't love my metaphors being quite this. on the nose.

Speaker 1 It's not ideal when the White House itself literally takes on the appearance of a lazy political cartoon.

Speaker 2 But here we are.

Speaker 1 Now, there are many things that are infuriating about this to me, Andy, including the fact that Trump had promised that this new ballroom would not involve demolishing the East Queen of the White House at all, saying, and I quote, it'll be near it, but not touching it.

Speaker 1 Though in his defence, Andy, promising not to touch something but doing it anyway, has famously never been more misstable.

Speaker 2 Have you heard of Donald Trump?

Speaker 2 For those who've not heard of him,

Speaker 2 10-time American Division Monger of the Year, performative selective peace fan, intermittent ethnic cleansing advocate, close personal friend of America's leading sex offender, convicted criminal, and ruiner of five reasons why Grover Cleveland is unique lists.

Speaker 2 He's the

Speaker 2 self-styled Mary Curie of Mayhemming the Constitution, the Rosalind Franklin of rancorous fear-mongering, the Ada Lovelace of aiming low, and the Virginia Woolf of vengeful whinging, if they had all been A men and B, not massive massive f ⁇ s.

Speaker 2 But I guess John I guess John as the old saying goes in Plutocrat Building chat planning permission schmlanning

Speaker 2 permission

Speaker 2 I mean is Trump not just finishing what Britain tried to start in 1814 when we

Speaker 2 heroically tried to do the decent thing and burn it to the ground

Speaker 1 Yeah, well that that's the point isn't it like there has been there have been to be fair renovations at the White House before Teddy Roosevelt built the West Wing Taft put in the Oval Office, Kennedy put in the Rose Garden, Nixon put in the press room on top of FDR's swimming pool and built a bowling alley, Obama put in a basketball court, and as you say, the British arguably tried to make the biggest design choice possible when we attempted to burn the thing down in 1814.

Speaker 1 But when it comes to demolition, Trump's running a pretty close second to the Redcoats.

Speaker 1 He's been insisting that absolutely everybody wants this ballroom, which is usually the kind of thing he says when absolutely nobody but him wants something.

Speaker 1 He said, and I quote Andy, they've wanted a ballroom at the White House for more than 150 years, but there's never been a president that was good at ballrooms.

Speaker 2 No one.

Speaker 1 That might be true, Andy.

Speaker 1 Maybe there hasn't been a president that was quote good at ballrooms, but is that a quality you want or particularly need in a president I think there's a reason that ballroom good at it

Speaker 1 has not come up as a subject much during presidential debates I cannot remember seeing someone say my opponent is just straight up bad at ballrooms

Speaker 1 he barely knows the difference between a ballroom and a banquet hall how can we trust him with running the country there is a There's a reason. There's a reason, Andy.

Speaker 1 Ballroom efficacy is not a recurrent theme in attack ads. Kavala Harris, bad at ballrooms, bad for America.
And that's because

Speaker 1 no one gives a f about ballrooms, Andy, apart from people who like ballrooms, and those people are all assholes.

Speaker 2 So, I mean, in terms of,

Speaker 2 you know, what

Speaker 2 a ballroom will look like, and obviously, you know, I mean, in terms of demolishing the East Wing, terrorists would have bitten their own arm off to pull off something like this, but Trump has heroically pre-empted them.

Speaker 2 So, in some ways, he's taken them out of the game quite effectively.

Speaker 1 Understated but classy do you think we can rule that out for the new new ballroom that's the thing it's not just the history that's people know it's what he's putting up in its place this ballroom is going to be massive the main white house residence is 55 000 square feet this uh i think this ballroom is set to be 90 000 square feet the white house is literally going to be in its shadow and it is monumentally tacky the renderings at the inside of it look like a liberace fever dream it looks

Speaker 1 it looks like something you'd expect to see an 18th century nobleman being dragged out of towards a guillotine. It looks like

Speaker 1 what AI would shit out if you gave it the prompt Versailles but bad.

Speaker 2 Watch this finally done.

Speaker 1 It's finally done, Annie. I want to see Kevin McLeod from Grand Designs, one of the nicest men on TV, to be the first person let in.
Because I want to see him walk in,

Speaker 1 look around and say, what the f did you do to this place?

Speaker 1 It looks like a dictator's ice rink and not in a good way.

Speaker 2 Other details of the plan include that it's going to have plenty of shiny poles,

Speaker 2 a casino urinal, so powerful men can play roulette mid-waz,

Speaker 2 and a golden statue of Trump himself in classic heroic pose, clad in MAGA-branded armour, bravely watching on whilst Pete Hegseth

Speaker 2 feeds an immigrant-looking baby to a crocodile. So it's going to be, you know, some up what America has become since you moved there, John.

Speaker 1 I will say it's consistent with Trump's M.O. as a developer in New York, Annie, where historically he would just smash things down first and then ask for permission later.

Speaker 1 It's also technically legal that under a

Speaker 1 nearly 60-year-old law, the White House is exempt from a key historic preservation rule, though presidents have typically followed that rule anyway.

Speaker 1 But something being typical has never been much of a constraint for Trump. The very nicest thing you can say about him is that he is an atypical atypical human being.

Speaker 2 Now,

Speaker 1 section 106, and I know you know this, Andrew. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 Of the National Historic Preservation Act requires federal agencies to undergo a review process, including getting input from the public regarding the impact of any construction projects on historic properties.

Speaker 1 However, say it with me, Section 107

Speaker 1 of that same act exempts three buildings and their ground from that process. The White House, the U.S.
Capitol, and the U.S. Supreme Court building.

Speaker 2 And you know what that means?

Speaker 1 The Supreme Court building is getting a fking makeup for this year.

Speaker 1 There is a non-zero chance that that place has a stripper pole and an all-you-can-eat buffet before the end of this calendar year.

Speaker 2 As you say, I mean, it's the biggest change to the White House since the rumoured sex dungeon installed by Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1957,

Speaker 2 shortly before a state visit by the young Queen Elizabeth II. That's entirely coincidental.

Speaker 2 Rumours of Eisenhower's sex dungeon have circulated ever since the start of this sentence just a few seconds ago.

Speaker 2 But, I mean, it just seems clear, John, that the

Speaker 1 I'm just

Speaker 1 getting worried about how close I was to that statement you just made, Andy. I'm wondering...
I've separated myself geographically, but I think that might be... illitigable over here

Speaker 2 um it makes you think the East Wing was just designed wrong.

Speaker 2 I think Trump would have left it alone if only it had been built in the shape of a Civil War Confederate general's buttocks or the testicles of a prominent slave owner. Then I think he would have

Speaker 2 would probably have

Speaker 2 left it as it was, but I guess upon

Speaker 2 such slender threads. In terms of

Speaker 2 you know, I mean, Trump is, you know, every week is busy in Trumpland, John, and I think we're now around about the 10-year mark of what is the world's longest continuously running single tantrum,

Speaker 2 which basically coincides with you stopping doing the bugle, actually.

Speaker 2 No blame, quite a lot of blame.

Speaker 2 But

Speaker 2 in terms of what else is going on with Trump, we had him raising tariffs on Canada because he got slightly annoyed by a TV advert.

Speaker 2 Is this

Speaker 2 the future of

Speaker 2 all politics now, just tantrum-based reactions to TV ads?

Speaker 1 Is that he might be one of the only people left on earth who actually watches ads on TV now?

Speaker 1 The easiest way to speak to him. We tried to do it

Speaker 1 on last week tonight, years ago.

Speaker 1 We hired this catheter cowboy to talk to him through the TV because it realised it was the only way you would actually have his attention if you bought ad space on Fox News between shows you knew he liked.

Speaker 1 You dressed the guy up like a cowboy, gave him a catheter, and then I think, I can't remember what we told him to do, something, not sign a bill or something.

Speaker 1 But yeah, it's the only way you can get through to him.

Speaker 2 I do feel a bit sorry for Mark Carney, the

Speaker 2 Canadian Prime Minister, having to deal with Trump. He's sort of got the expression and the sort of body language of someone who's just been tasked with teaching the violin to an incontinent walrus.

Speaker 2 And he said Canada will restart trade talks, quotes, when Americans are ready.

Speaker 2 And that sort of economic and political potty training is looking like it's going to take possibly decades.

Speaker 2 Maybe Trump's fifth, sixth term. Do we think maybe at that point we'll be

Speaker 2 thinking too far ahead there, John?

Speaker 1 I mean, you say that like it's a joke, but you don't build a 90,000 square foot ballroom if you have any fing intention of leaving.

Speaker 2 Then there's the

Speaker 2 warships in the Caribbean. There's paying himself $230 million worth of compensation.

Speaker 2 And his latest... I mean, in terms of the general state of America, John, how would you score America, let's say, out of 10 right now?

Speaker 2 Well, you know,

Speaker 2 Andy,

Speaker 1 it's a strong two.

Speaker 2 I will say Warships of the Caribbean.

Speaker 1 Warships of the Caribbean is a strong contender for Johnny Depp's next episode of that franchise.

Speaker 1 Johnny Depp as a pirate invading Venezuela.

Speaker 1 That is something I might actually see.

Speaker 2 Just some breaking news, actually. The White House has slammed the Billboard Latin Music Prize Committee for overlooking President Trump

Speaker 2 for Artist of the Year.

Speaker 2 A White House spokesperson said, the president just sang a rousing and relatively tuneful rendition of I Am What I Am in the shower in a Mexican accent,

Speaker 2 and not awarding him Artist of the Year shows how woke and political the music industry has become. So,

Speaker 2 no, it's hard, it's disappointing to see that.

Speaker 2 Do you have any shreds of optimism, John,

Speaker 2 for America before we move on to our next story?

Speaker 2 Well, no,

Speaker 2 no.

Speaker 1 I was going to try and engineer something up there, but,

Speaker 1 you know,

Speaker 1 despair is the dominant flavour of

Speaker 1 America this year.

Speaker 1 Maybe next year things will turn around.

Speaker 1 America is very good at not acknowledging reality. So maybe they will dig themselves out of this hole.
I certainly hope so.

Speaker 2 Or just keep digging and emerge on the other side of the world. Where would that be?

Speaker 1 That's the thing. Yeah, steer into the skid, exactly.

Speaker 2 Let's move on, Chris. There we go, right.

Speaker 2 France being France news now, and

Speaker 2 yes, it's the manoeuvre in the Louvre.

Speaker 2 The an audacious heist. There's such a strong correlation between heisting and audacity.

Speaker 2 There it is.

Speaker 2 Look at them go!

Speaker 2 I mean this might I think this might be my favourite crime

Speaker 2 ever committed. And obviously

Speaker 2 I don't want to trivialize the suffering of the members of the French royal family in the mid-19th century

Speaker 2 who've

Speaker 2 seen their jewels so so distressingly

Speaker 2 removed. But I mean it was a tremendous bit of work.

Speaker 2 It lasted less than 10 minutes whilst the museum was open, involved a mechanical ladder, some fun-sized mini chainsaws, a couple of scooters, and they pinched what were described by experts as some serious bling.

Speaker 2 The jewels have been kept just in case France ever sees the light and reinstalls its monarchy.

Speaker 2 And looking at what's happening to its current and recent past prime ministers at the moment, that emphatically cannot be ruled out as something that may happen in the next

Speaker 2 week. John, you've long been the Bugles

Speaker 2 French Arts and museums

Speaker 2 crime correspondent

Speaker 2 this is a story you've been waiting for

Speaker 2 Andy

Speaker 1 I would say you know when times are difficult as they are now as we've been talking about it doesn't it doesn't feel like collectively we're being asked to play life on easy mode right now.

Speaker 1 Sometimes you do need a new story that's going to give you a bit of a lift. I'm not talking about someone turning hundred or a kid getting pulled out of a well by a dog.
That doesn't do it for me.

Speaker 1 I'm talking about an international jewelry heist, Andy. That is exactly what everyone needed right now.
I'm going to go ahead and say that this was a very good thing to happen.

Speaker 1 I'm glad this heist happened. No one got hurt if you don't count Windows as people, and I personally don't.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 1 as far as I'm concerned, it's a net positive. Like you say, dressed to construction workers, in and out in seven minutes, motor scooters.

Speaker 1 If there wasn't a fake mustache involved, I think that was a shame. We needed this heist.

Speaker 1 What's not to like? International Crime Syndicate operates in the Louvre, jewels are stolen.

Speaker 1 Fundamentally, the French are probably to blame. This ticks a lot of my best.

Speaker 1 And I'll say this, Addie, people there seem to like it too. There was an American tourist I saw at the BBC who was interviewed.

Speaker 1 She said, and I quote, I think the heist made it exciting to go to the Louvre.

Speaker 1 I think later we're going to try and find where people look in and take a picture near it. What?

Speaker 1 Absolutely monumental f ⁇ you to every other item inside the loop, Andy.

Speaker 1 You walk past the winged victory of Samothrace, a masterpiece of Greek sculpture, to go and take a picture of something that isn't there anymore.

Speaker 2 Just

Speaker 1 put yourself, Andy, into the winged victory of Samothrace's shoes.

Speaker 2 Normally...

Speaker 1 You're being walked past to see the Mona Lisa, a B plus Da Vinci on its best day, but now

Speaker 1 you'll be ignored to see a broken window. I'm not sure you're technically art anymore.
You're a geographic marker on a museum map to somewhere else.

Speaker 2 We mentioned the Mona Lisa, herself a veteran of being stolen from the Louvre after she was whipped off the wall back in 1911.

Speaker 2 On hearing news of this latest heist, the Mona Lisa was reported to be looking concerned. Or was it disappointed? Or was it mildly amused by unsurprised? Or nonchalantly disinterested?

Speaker 2 So hard to tell.

Speaker 2 But it's, I mean, fortunately for France, in terms of the lost jewellery,

Speaker 2 and obviously, you know, it's dear to the hearts of fans of the French post-revolution reinstituted monarchy that people generally forget about.

Speaker 2 But luckily for France, there are loads of jewelry shops in Paris.

Speaker 2 I guess it's one of the benefits of everyone having affairs all the time.

Speaker 2 So

Speaker 2 they should be able to restock quite easily.

Speaker 2 And also the Louvre has got loads of other stuff.

Speaker 2 And you mentioned just a couple of the famous bits they've got over 500 000 objects in their collection around about 35 000 on display so i think we should give the louvre credit john and say well done 99.998 percent of your stuff yeah has not been stolen in broad daylight let's let's give them credit for that

Speaker 1 also also for what it's worth andy there's This wasn't even the first time the Louvre's been robbed. The Mona Lisa was famously stolen in 1911.
In 1976, King Charles X's sword was stolen.

Speaker 1 I think the most recent robbery was in 1998. The point is, robbing the Louvre is a proud French tradition.

Speaker 1 The only way the thieves that stole those jewels could have done this in a more French way was if they pole-vaulted up the window with a giant baguette, smoking a Giton cigarette while dressed like a sexually aggressive skunk.

Speaker 2 Now,

Speaker 2 I believe

Speaker 2 they have.

Speaker 2 Didn't you once do a voiceover for a sexually aggressive skunk in a film? McArton?

Speaker 2 Is that out yet? I forget.

Speaker 1 I think if I did, Disney would have recast it with a younger voice now.

Speaker 1 I believe they have, tragically, I think they have a couple of men in custody now, which is very disappointing.

Speaker 1 But my favorite suspect was a man who appeared in a single AP photograph and immediately caught the attention of the internet. Do you have the photo there, Chris? Bring it up.
Look at this man.

Speaker 1 Look.

Speaker 1 He's fucking man right now.

Speaker 2 Look, I don't know.

Speaker 1 I don't know if you can look more like a jewel thief without having a bag of stolen jewels in your hands.

Speaker 1 That is a man who walks into a designer boutique and heads straight for the diamond swiper section.

Speaker 1 Look at the expression on that French policeman's face there. You can keep thinking, are you real?

Speaker 1 And he wasn't alone. Lots of people online claimed that he was AI, but the photographer apparently confirmed that the man was real.
He was just a passerby unconnected to the investigation.

Speaker 1 No one has ever looked like that in human history.

Speaker 1 If he didn't steal those diamonds, he was on his way to steal some different ones.

Speaker 2 So the

Speaker 2 heisters, apparently, they tend to go for jewelry because it can be broken up and sold rather than paintings and sculptures

Speaker 2 which can't. I mean, it's be quite hard to try and fence that on the back.

Speaker 2 Would you like two square inches of canvas with a small bit of an enigmatic smile on no how about one a little bit with the one the one remaining ear of some bearded Dutch dude still no how about this little scrap of miserable looking dark red paint blush

Speaker 2 Rothko you fing Philistine

Speaker 2 Maybe I can interest you in this very finely sculpted Todger or perhaps and even throw an extra bollock in as well. I can do it for two mil.

Speaker 2 So I guess that's why that's why jewellery is more vulnerable. Andy,

Speaker 1 I've always admired your ability and inclination to force feed Rothko jokes to audiences.

Speaker 1 Four foie gras, putting it right down their fing throat.

Speaker 1 Is he going to do his Rothko stuff, mummy?

Speaker 2 Definitely good ball.

Speaker 2 The Rothko stuff is not so much about the actual joke, it's more about the mood that it creates.

Speaker 2 Well obviously John

Speaker 2 Obviously John I mean you know that all the the major art galleries of the world and museums of the world will be very concerned about

Speaker 2 about stuff like this happening. In fact, you know a friend of mine he was told by his doctor

Speaker 2 it's a very moving story actually this John

Speaker 2 a friend of mine was told by his doctor he had he had less than a hundred years to live and so he wrote himself a bucket list and he wanted to visit every major art gallery museum in the world in fact I first encountered him queuing up to get a get a ticket to one of the big galleries in New York and he told me his plan and that he wanted me to go with him to all the galleries and I said wow I said let's take a moment to think about all this.

Speaker 2 We've only just met.

Speaker 2 I could tell he was upset. Oh, frick, he said.
Anyway, I agreed to go with him.

Speaker 2 So we came to London, and anyway, we queued up for the gallery in London a couple of gallows.

Speaker 2 And he was talking to his French lady friend about which of London's galleries to go to, the one with all the modern stuff, or the one with all the old Turner paintings.

Speaker 2 They decided to go to both after a very intense conversation, a real tête art tete.

Speaker 2 His French friend had recently acquired a pair of vintage antique scimitars. He called Madame Two Swords.

Speaker 2 Anyway, I'd always dreamed of being an MP, this guy, John. So, whenever it came to anything like a vote, this affected his language.

Speaker 2 I said to him, Do you reckon people think London has the best museums in the world? And he said, Oh, it's tough to call, and it could go either way.

Speaker 2 I reckon some people would veer towards I, and others would veer an A.

Speaker 2 What time did you have to leave? Right, so we've got still quite a few to get through.

Speaker 2 Tell me, we had a snack we're in in the QF Museum, and then he brought this weird cured meat laced with ecstasy made from the backside of a large horned deer, which, to improve the flavour, spent its entire life sitting on a big French soft cheese.

Speaker 2 It was quite tasty, though. The British mousse-y ham.

Speaker 2 Anyway, so we're then

Speaker 1 anyway, you don't get to say anyway after a pun like that, Andrew.

Speaker 2 So we uh we popped up to Oxford for our next museum. Um we had a chat

Speaker 2 There are fewer than ten left

Speaker 2 We popped up to Oxford for our next museum trip we had a a chat on the way. Decided to do we actually might be interested in this.

Speaker 2 He wanted to know, my friend, whether people called Joan were better than people called John. And he decided to work it out with a kind of head-to-head between famous Jones and famous John.

Speaker 2 So he made a list of who he would put up against who. So he said, I reckon you'd want Armor Trading to take on Malkovich.

Speaker 2 You'd want Avark to go up against Oliver. But who would you pit Rivers against?

Speaker 2 Oh, tough crowd.

Speaker 2 So anyway, we went to Paris and he dropped a trail of crumbs in case he got lost. I said, You're making a mess.
He said, Don't worry, someone will louver up the mess.

Speaker 2 We went to a queue to another museum, happened to be queuing up with a load of early 20th century rock bands, John, and he asked these rock bands to grade 1960s bands, but they were only allowed to give one band the top grade.

Speaker 2 It was interesting to see who they rated the highest, actually. Queens of the Stone Age, they say Rolling Stones A.
Lincoln Park, they say Beatles A, but Muse say Dorset.

Speaker 2 I don't even know if that's the right museum anymore.

Speaker 2 So then we went to Florence and this German billionaire

Speaker 2 advertised for someone to accompany him around the museum. So very strict criteria, though, but my friend thought he had a good chance.
So he rang the number and described himself.

Speaker 2 Yes, said the German billionaire, you fit the profile.

Speaker 2 Anyway, then in Bilbao,

Speaker 2 in Bilbao,

Speaker 2 my friend swallowed this electronic device that heats and melts solid adhesive so you can squirt it exactly where you want.

Speaker 2 But luckily, someone knew first aid knew to kind of use an abdominal thrust to get him to cough it up with a Glugunheim lick.

Speaker 2 Glugunheim lick.

Speaker 2 So anyway, we went back.

Speaker 2 We ended up

Speaker 2 Okay, I'll cut the next three out.

Speaker 2 We ended up back in the USA, John, in DC.

Speaker 2 And I told my friend, I've read this story about how 1980s musicians had bought 1980s England cricketers at a special charity auction.

Speaker 2 David Burn and talking heads bid successfully for David Gower, and Morrissey and his old bandmates, they bought both of them. And he said, What? The Smithsone?

Speaker 2 Right.

Speaker 2 We're done. So,

Speaker 2 right, I think it's interval time.

Speaker 2 John, it's been,

Speaker 2 as it was for almost 300 episodes, an

Speaker 2 absolute delight

Speaker 2 to have you on the show.

Speaker 2 Everyone, say goodbye to John.

Speaker 2 Bye, everyone.

Speaker 2 Have a great night. On Oliver!

Speaker 3 There you go, John Oliver there, who has never been paid to watch cricket. What a loser.

Speaker 3 And being paid to watch cricket explains why I will be in Australia doing live bugles in Brisbane on the 2nd of December and Melbourne on the 22nd of December and stand-up shows, the Zoltgeist Australia Edition, in Perth on the 26th of November, Brisbane, Adelaide and Melbourne on the 3rd, 14th and 23rd of December, respectively, and Sydney on the 2nd of January.

Speaker 3 Next week, we'll bring you the second half of the 18th Birthday Live Show, featuring the people who are currently third and fourth on the all-time Bugle most frequent co-host chart, Alice Fraser and Nish Kumar.

Speaker 3 If you want to join the Bugle voluntary subscription scheme to keep our shows free, flourishing, and independent for another 18 years to infinity, then go to thebuglepodcast.com and click the donate button.

Speaker 3 Until next week, goodbye.