The Bugle - 4168 - Trump too nasty even for Covid

Episode Date: October 6, 2020

Andy, Helen and Anuvab take a tour through three evergreen stories, Trump, Covid and culture wars! Happy 2020 everyone!GO TO THE STORE TO SEE NEW MERCH!Support what we do by making a one off or monthly donation here: http://thebuglepodcast.com/#donate. We carry no ads and exist because you make it happen!We have a sister show, The Last Post, which you can hear here. Follow us on YouTube or Insta and see parts of this episode with actual video.The Bugle is hosted this week by:Andy ZaltzmanHelen ZaltzmanAnuvab PalAnd produced by Chris Skinner LISTEN TO RICHIE FIRTH: TRAVEL HACKER. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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We're doing a show at 7pm on the 24th of October. Details are at, well, on the internet. Chris, can you be more specific than that? What, than the internet? What, yeah, than the internet. Was there a particular bit of the internet? Yeah, you can go to our new podcastfestival.com or one of our social media channels. And, you know, or you could just use the internet to find out what 7pm is in your time.

Yeah. Because that's 7pm GMT. Also while you're on the internet, you can buy all the new bugle merch, including the new Christmasle merch, including the new Christmas jumper which looks absolutely spectacular. The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world. Hello Bugleers and welcome to another issue of the audio newspaper that was sent by Almighty God himself back in 2007 to chart the final decline of the human race and the planet, both

of which were of course. Always seen very much as a first draft by the renowned deity and winner of the 33 AD worst parent of the year award. I am Andy Zoltzman, although it's been a so I'm not even sure I believe myself when I say that anymore. And this is issue 4168 of the bugle, coincidentally, would you believe the average number of excuses, a hypothetical CGI White House press secretary, would wheel out to exonerate a hypothetical CGI tycoon president who would just

drown twelve puppies in a vat of whiskey while slapping a praying nun in the face with a Jesus-shaped prosthetic willy before acknowledging that yes he might have slightly misacted. I am in the shed in London it's the 5th of October 2020 and joining me for the latest celebration of the glorious day of our planet from well just a little bit south of here the quibbling sibling herself Helen's Alzheimer's Hello Andy How are you Helen? Still alive apparently

Oh they go, unless it's the afterlife Something to cling to, superb glasses by the way Are they new? No Oh life. Something to cling to. Superb glasses by the way, are they new? No, but you know, they've not got anything cricket related on them so maybe you just can see them before. Helen has won them on at least one previous bugle on the show. Oh okay, I'm not very good at noticing these things. Helen I should say is in Brighton currently, which is basically directly south of where I am, from even further south and quite a lot east.

Joining us from India, Anivabh pal. Hello Andy. Hello Helen. Hello Anivabh. Hello. Pleasure to see you. Likewise. How's India Anivabh?

Well, Andy Helen, the biggest news from the subcontinent is that the government has finally found a cure for the coronavirus. Oh right. A lot of congrats. Thank you very much. And because I personally did it as well. And it lies not in a vaccine, which these advanced countries are so foolishly searching for. But as Andy knows, well, in the Indian Premier League, a two-month-long cricket tournament

That has the nation so enthralled that trivial news like India quickly climbing to the most infected nation Is relegated to the third page of the newspaper for the much more important headline that a certain Mumbai team opener has accidentally Edged a ball to first slip It's quite big news in 2020 cricket because obviously you don't have slips for much of the innings. So actually a slip catch is probably definitely from page news, I'd say, Anivabwe, head of any, you know, ephemeral viral related news. They're absolutely right, Adi. And I think it's a testament to the state of, you know, health services data in this country when U&D tweet about IPL statistics, it is more shared on Twitter than when the number of infections statistics are tweeted by the health ministry.

Well, that's a bit of a concern. Exactly, exactly, Helen, priority. In fact, some state leaders with the arrival of the IPL have declared complete victory over the virus, and it was demonstrated by the fact that this massive cricket tournament is taking place as you both know well in the Indian heartland of the United Arab Emirates, a place that is so Indian that it isn't even in India. Yes, I mean, I guess they had to choose the UAE because, you know, it is a place that is so soulless that even a virus wouldn't bother going there. I guess it was probably the safest place to hold a cricket tournament. We are recording on the 5th of October 2020 today is World Teachers Day and I mean it just rather raised the question should we actually be celebrating teachers? Should we

celebrate these textbook wuggling whiteboard bothering? I know more than your child about something I've been trained in self-proclaimed educators who insist on filling the world's children with the knowledge, skills, hope and curiosity that on first contacts with the reality of the world will inevitably lead them to a lifetime of confusion and crushed expectations. Are these really the kind of people we should be holding up as inspirations for the world? If this year has taught us one thing, and let's be honest, it's tried to teach us lots of things, but we're gonna do our best to ignore them all. But if this year has taught us one thing, it is that knowing about the world is far less comforting than for example, being a brick,

because I have bricks in the wall of my house, and they've dealt with this year far more stably than I have. So don't celebrate teachers, just chat to a brick. Are the bricks better or are other things than you as well? Like cleaning? Well, I mean almost certainly Helen, I have a... Time management. I think I have two skills in life and he'd probably back the brick

on everything apart from cricket statistics and possibly comedy. People always and they say that teacher say inspirational things. In the movies, they always show you teachers that give inspirational speeches. My memory of my favorite teacher was my 11th grade history teacher, Mr. Robert Myers, who was an Anglo-Indian gentleman, who said to our whole class, leave the country as soon as you can and promptly migrate it to Australia. Well, in many ways that's a practical lesson isn't that, teaching you about the harsh realities of economics. So teaching you, and from that you can learn all about history and everything that goes

really. There's too many teachers just stuck to books rather than, you know, action, teach by actions. Well, I had a teacher that used to throw things at pupils so is that action? Well it depends what they're throwing. Like board rubbers, books. He also had a plate on his desk that had the spores from where a mushroom had disintegrated on it and he just kept it there for years. I had a teacher who had a phone brick that he would occasionally throw at people.

The problem is once you've done it once, it's easiest to really have any particular threat. What he really needed was a selection of bricks, most of which were foam, but at least one of which was brick. Man, he would have had awful undivided attention. You know, the thing is sometimes I it isn't physical torture sometimes it's you know academic and psychological torture that I was quite interested in my class teacher one I mean out of context anybody that sentence sounds really bad really bad. Correct. Correct. Sitting alone in a house in Calcutta It's a worrying thing to say to people. But she used to have a big, big, big sort of thing of chart paper put up and she'd have,

she'd have a drawing of the guy that had the best exam results and he'd be the tallest and then she'd draw like where we all stood in comparison to him. And she had a little arrow. I was usually a speck because he was really tall. And then she drew an arrow and said, this is you and you are nothing and this is the main guy. And he is 94%. Right, it's time for the top story this week. Donald Trump has COVID. Now, to be honest, this is October and I'm quite surprised that it took this long for that headline to come into existence. Last Friday, we're recording on Monday, this with last Friday, the news broke that Trump had tested positive for COVID-19 and vice

versa. Our sympathies to both for they must be going through, I wouldn't wish either of them on my worst enemies. Trump has promised or threatened that he would keep on working through his disease, he's been photographed signing blank bits of paper. Well, that's real work Andy, this is how you learn. That basically tells you everything about how American politics works. Obviously we wish the president a full recovery as well as a new, calmer, wiser perspective on life, a massive, electoral humiliation and a long, slow, retirement haunted by guilt. Sadly, if he's only the first is likely. Now, it has been, you know, it's been an odd year.

It's been a depressing campaign watching America as fans and, you know, well, you know, as none of us are allowed to vote you know we're voiceless in this and yet as I keep saying we should be the people allowed to vote in American election and how how how's this story struck you as citizens of the of the world and into the universe of which your trump is de facto king, it's impressive that even during this, he has kept working by on Saturday having a photo shoot, working busily in two different fake offices in the hospital, and the metadata on the photo

show that they were taking only 10 minutes apart. So just lots of switch locations a lot to be the most productive. I'll keep freshen your mind, haven't you? Right. And then on Sunday, went for a car ride, which apparently, so in the presidential SUV, it's um, hermetically sealed against chemical attacks. So whoever is inside it with him, is even more risk of catching COVID. So they did it.

So it's coming from the best. I'm basically sealed from chemical I get indeed biological attack, but within it he was essentially biologically attacking his own security detail. The call was coming from inside the house. Melania has refused to visit him because that would expose the agents who would drive her to the hospital and the medical staff who would take her to him. So someone in the family is being responsible. Yes, it's quite of this joy right that he took on Sunday, little break from being in

hospital to go for a spin in a motorcade and wave his fans, seeking to project strength or at least the kind of weakness that idiots think is strength, which is quite a big difference, which is quite a big difference. He tweeted that he would pay a quote, surprise visit to the patriots outside his hospital. I'm a curious form of patriotism in it that Trump inspires,

to support a man who stands against pretty much everything America likes to pretend that it stands for but I guess Patriotism is like money. You've either got it or you haven't or you've got some of it from time to time You probably inherited it from your parents or found some in the back of the sofa Yeah, there might be a bit down the back of the sofa All you can pretend you've got more of it than you actually do just to try and fit in and look cool Or can you wander it?

You can you can you can launder patriotism. You might not fully understand how it works or why people are so obsessed with it and think there was in principle, there's nothing wrong with it, the way it's come to be used these days, cause it's widespread damage and misery around the world. And you'd be entirely right to be suspicious of people who flashed theirs about too much. So the similarities are uncanny and who have know I've been in India, obviously, to overt patriotism has become a massive political strategy really for Narendra Modi and his government.

And I don't know, what's Modi's response to Trump's personal viral issue being? So the car ride Helen talked about, it's got a lot of press here, right? Because as Indian politics has become very simple now. You are either for Prime Minister Modi or against India. That is really the way to look at any sort of patriot. So basically he got out of the hospital full of COVID, got into a car and waved to his fans. Right? And Prime Minister Modi came out in defense of that and said, there's nothing wrong in meeting die-hard nationalists.

Right? Which makes, which makes sense because it got me thinking about anyone with a fan base. Right? The thing is, Andy, can we really keep a very famous person down with COVID for too long? And then I started thinking about you, Andy. And I thought, you know, Andy, God forbid, if you were struck with this virus and your cricket statistics fans were clamoring outside your house as they often do. Would you not leave your house, shielded by heavy security and weave a little, maybe even my MISQCAT? I mean, yes, I mean obviously, but I have a greater responsibility to fans of cricket statistics, even then Donald Trump has the public of America, they need me, I think. I have a duty to get out there and shout averages out of a window. If, you know, if I can't do that then,

I mean, what's the point of, why did I follow those world wars? You know, if I have to succumb to whatever the virus tells me to do. That's great when a kind of grandiose idea of self is coupled with very low ambition. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha I think I had that as a review for one of my Adam Rishows. The latest medical briefing on Trump's condition, well, just take a guess, beaglers, or make it up, because no one has a f***ing clue because everything is shrouded in deceit and secrecy.

Now obviously we do not wish illness or death on anyone. Unlike Donald Trump himself, of course, who through his policies this year has done exactly that to his own people and to show the magic of high office, those wishes have actually come true for him to a statistically remarkable degree. He is not currently on oxygen, according to his doctor.

I don't know if he need it, does he need oxygen? What to respire, is, he evolved beyond that. I think he might have gone beyond that. Is an anaerobic, is that what you're... Yes, I think he might be some kind of anaerobic being. Or he conducts photosynthesis. That kind of thing. That's too green for him, I think.

They're having to try and find the 206 guests who attended his rally at his own golf club in New Jersey the other day. As if you were attending a Trump rally at a Trump golf club could ever bite you on the arse. Just 206 counters of rally, that doesn't seem enough for me. I mean, you know, if your rally needs at least a thousand Helen, I'm going to take that what I said about ambition earlier. Yes. You're the, you see, the absolute arbiter of the meaning of all words in the world.

Because the count as a rally with only 206 people. I suppose it really depends on the intent. There was also the event at the White House, which has been pin-pointed as a potential super spreading event when Amy Coney barrett's the nominee for the Supreme Court, vacated by the untimely death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, was paraded in front of hundreds of people closely packed, not wearing masks because why would you wear a mask when you're celebrating skewing the balance of American politics and society for a generation? You want to be able to fully appreciate the Machiavellian grins on people's faces.

So I got to understand people not wanting to wear masks. But the virus never wanted to miss an open goal. It seems to have attended that event as well. And now loads of people have tested positive. And it's particularly curious, because in Trump's world, illness is a weakness. Essentially, he lambasted Hillary Clinton in 2016 for being ill, I think he had to go Abraham Lincoln for being a wimp for the dog and JFK for being a simpering milk stop for getting in the way of that of that bullet. So how was Helen, how do you

spend a lot of time in America over recent years? And... Can we grow up in a household where illness was a weakness and a frowned upon. But yeah, I'm not sure our father had quite the same go-getting energy as Donald Trump was shown through his career. Now I think, you know, if only Trump could have learned from him, the world would be a happier place. But it's only why Trump can spin this as a positive. Yes.

And how's he going to do that? I don't know how Andy, because luckily my mind doesn't think the same as his, but he does have a wonderful capacity for turning shit into even more gargantuan amounts of shit and then throwing them around. That's a good one. It is unfortunately a skill which has demonstrated so many times. So I think he'll manage to say that Black Lives Matter gave it to him, the Dems gave it to him. He's defeated the virus and is the strongest man in the world. Even if he dies, then he'll find a way to spin that from beyond the grave.

You know he will. So you're basically saying he's an alchemic shit volcano? I'm not not saying that. Good. If you guys remember, there was that famous Hollywood film where Kevin Klein was a pig farmer and part-time ventralocrest. And his main thing was that he looked like the president of the United States.

And when the president becomes incapacitated, they hire this pig farmer and ventraloccus and he becomes an excellent president because he starts asking basic questions like why do we have to drop this bomb questions that happen with us teenagers so perhaps it's it's like some version of that that we're looking at and see what's that film called you know Dave Dave thank you thank you well I'll give it. It's said, I mean, would that be reassuring? If that's, if that's the case, I mean, well, they did elect an unqualified person to be president and it didn't work out like in the film.

Yes, I guess so. But I guess, you know, films don't, they are not always ruthlessly accurate. That's a great problem with fiction. It's followed on Hot on the Hills of the Debates last week, which happened after we recorded last week's Bugle. In the interest of balance, we should say that the debate was both a car crash and a train wreck and the Titanic hammering snout first into Mount Everest. Joe Biden described Trump's performance in the debate as a wake-up call to all Americans, which does raise the question of how the f*** have you slept through the last four f***ing years?

That is like coming back from a seaside trip to Normandy in June 1944, saying, well, the ice cream shop was shut for some reason and they wouldn't let us go paddleboarding when this group of rather noisy Americans had taken our normal spot. But otherwise we had an absolutely lovely day. He's all dirty, he needs naps. It was the moderator Chris Wallace who was his performance was somewhat criticized. I never dreamt that it would go off the tracks the way that it did. Now again that shows that a charming degree of naivety from someone who has been

alive for a long time and American. I read somewhere that the longest Trump waited before interrupting Joe Biden was about six seconds and I'd like to posit a theory and I just want to know what you think. The first debate I ever took part in was in Kerkata when I was in fourth grade, and I was nudged by my neighbor, Prashant Agarwal, who turned to me and said, the way to win this debate is just make some sort of noise while the other guy is speaking. I think the topic I did with animals or colonialism, I did what it was. And the moment the other guy started speaking, every 10 seconds I just went, wow, and I somehow feel like this presidential election, this kind of got hold of maybe some memory of this

or tape of this and because it followed the same sort of batter. Again, I'm bringing this up because it's World Teacher's Day and you know, this is a sharing. Well, I think Boris Johnson was clearly, you know, given the same instruction, judging by how he's tried to bluster his way out of prime minister's questions recently. And do you or a debate champion at school, weren't you? I'm not sure I was a champion. And you win a gold pen, like a gold quill pen. Oh, I can't. You know, what every teenage boy wants.

Yeah, I mean, they were all the rage back in the early 90s, golden quill pens. Has anything good ever come from a debate? From a debate. Or a golden quill. Apart from the quill that you loved so much, you forgot all about it. Yeah.

Yeah. And it's certainly not recent. I mean, we haven't been a recency buyer here, Helen. Not all debates have been as bad as last week's debate. Given you are a debate winner, Andy, and I don't know British debate in customs are different from here, was listening a part of the thing? No, absolutely not. No, that's a sign of weakness

listening to a sign of, it's almost a kind of sign of being European I think. So, no, we're certainly at the Tobias School I was at. We are not really encouraged to listen, just talk more loudly, which is the equivalent of listening. I mean, why cultivate a skill you all never need to use in adult life? To be honest, the skills I've ended up using in adult life. I don't know. I'm not... Bullshitting? Bullshitting and obsessing about people hitting balls with a bat and the numerical implications thereof. I don't know, I'm not an expert on what are relevant life skills to inculcate in youngsters, Helen. No shit.

Did you also see how Britain has aced Covid this week by misplacing nearly 16,000 COVID test results in the last few days? Yes. Because of the limitations of Excel spreadsheets, not being able to have quite enough columns and they didn't realise. Well, I mean this is a heroicery isn't it? Yeah, we brisk, we will not be cowed by technology, we will not be cowed by numbers. I mean this was described as a technical glitch, wasn't it? That was the official, there was a technical glitch surrounding the massive misreporting of the number of Covid cases. Isn't not sure- Isn't it just that many people having COVID? Yes, well that's a technical glitch, I guess. I mean, I don't know if the technical glitches with the spreadsheet

or if it's a technical glitch in the tracking and tracing system or a technical glitch whereby under a quarter of the population of the UK can vote in a government with no discernible qualifications to have de facto dictatorial powers led by a man with absolutely no appropriate experience for the job. That, that to me, that's the key technical glitch we need to be addressing. And, you know, Bill Gates not being enough

in columns in Lincolnshire, sort of showing what is really great about the English language, about which you know so much. That's right Andy, these birds made me very proud. They acquired five new African grey parrots in August apparently because a lot of people during quarantine realize they do not actually have the capacity for a pet parrot and they put them all in quarantine together and they all were swearing their little beaks off. So they've had to remove them from public

display. I would pay extra to go and see five parents swearing in unison or apparently one of them would swear and then the next one would laugh and then swear. They'd all go around kind of appreciating the swears and then replicating them. So I mean how was it? Do we know yet? Was it was it one sweary parents who then taught the other parrots to swear, or have all the parrot owners in Lincolnshire, where this world-loved park is located, have they all separately been teaching their parrots to swear, and then presumably laughing when their parrots do swear, which their parents then learn to follow

up their swears with. Well Andy, what percentage of owners of parrots with the capacity for speech acquisition do you think just launch straight in with the swears? Well, about 90? Well, about 90 I would think. So they may have come with some vocabulary already. Yeah. But what they've done now is separated them and put them in different groups to discourage this behaviour, which suggests they're just going to spread the swearing to even more parrots. Right. Surely.

This is... I mean, we should put this in context. This was by no means the least dignified conversation of last week. And it does show where we've reached as a planet that a cage full of foul-beaked parrots was more insightful, polite and civilised than a presidential debate in America. It did rather highlight the problems we've got as a species at the moment. Apparently, this wearing did slightly stop when they switched off the 24-hour news channel that was on the TV and the parrots cage. And presumably, the parrots stopped and listened to the entire

swearing before they responded to the other parrots with their swearing. So yeah, you don't want to interrupt in swearing parrots, do you? has said that it's been forced to halt its operations in India due to government threats and reprisals. The Indian government froze Amnesty's bank accounts. Not exactly sort of exuding a, there's definitely nothing to see here vibe. And when Amnesty International Hulted's Operations generally that has assigned that there is a very good reason for Amnesty International Halted Operations, generally that is a sign that there is a very good reason for Amnesty International to be operating somewhere. Can you fill us in on this story and what's been going on? Well, that's right, Andy.

Well, BBC has been reporting, Amnesty International says, it's been forced to halt its India operations due to reprisals from the government. Now, according to me, there's a bit of whining going on here from Amnesty because the watchdog has accused the government of pursuing a witch hunt against the organization. And I don't see how this is a witch hunt. All the government is done is that it's frozen their bank accounts, forced to lay off all

their staff in the country, told them to suspend all their campaign and research work and arrested the head of Amnesty. I don't see this at all as a witch hunt. All that's happened is that these tiny things have happened. And the Indian government said in a statement that the accusations were unfortunate, exaggerated, and far from the truth. The head of amnesty, who was arrested for a bit,

said from prison, that this sort of clamp down is seen as the death of a transparent human rights organization being allowed to function in a country claiming to be an open westernized democracy. And to them, I would say, you know, Amnesty, don't be so limited in your view. Be open, be global. You know, what you see in India is draconian, Vladimir Putin or Premier Xi would see it as just another Tuesday. So I think again it's about perspective, you know? That is in fact the title of Putin and Xi's new podcast, just a little bit of a Tuesday in which they tell funny stories about the latest

to clamp down on political opponents and in terms of people in concentration camps. So it's a good listen. I'm comfortable but interesting. Now just for the record, this is apparently the first time Ampesti is being shared down in India, that is with the government's defense. They said that in the history of India, this is the fourth time we've shut Amnesty down. And this is the only time we've been in power. So three other times, other people shut you down. So please do not only hold us responsible, which if nothing else,

Andy shows a very good understanding of Indian history by the government, which is why it is such a good government. And also if anyone is listening to this podcast, big fan of Prime Minister Modi, big fan. Yes, we're shutting down Amrstein International, it's not, and it doesn't, like I said, it doesn't sort of exude, you know, it doesn't sort of project the idea that there's nothing there to be concerned about. It's like when you hear someone use the words, there's no need to panic but you just assume that there is absolutely a hundred percent cast iron reason to panic. It's not like a guilty looking child, unprompted, telling Mummy and daddy, I definitely did not coat the hamstring

peanut butter and glue a little miter on its head to make it look like a rodent pope in a peanut butter chasible. It just raises suspicions when that gun thing happens, isn't it? Absolutely, I mean if you remember on this podcast we've talked a while ago about the Citizenship Amendment Act that happened in India a few months ago. Basically they were trying to exclude any fleeing Muslim refugees from seeking refuge in India, claiming that in India a few months ago. Basically they were trying to exclude any fleeing Muslim refugees from seeking refuge in India claiming that India would only give refuge to Hindus and there were protests all around the country and riots and all sorts of things and The police are just bringing out char cheats and accusations And it turns out, you know shockingly

It's basically the protesters who are to blame and they've been imprisoned and none of the people that were sort of beating up the protesters, none of them have any charges against them. So, again, justice is being served, so I don't know what amnesty is whining about. They apparently claim that a fair trial is not taking place. But, you know, again, how would we know? Because now amiss is a council person. So we'd never know, and which is good. So I think the government is doing its job. It's just statistics and chance that nobody from the government was responsible for the protest. It's just the people opposed to the government that were responsible and are in prison for it. Which again is the result of a fair and transparent process?

Anyvab, whenever you're on the show, you'd like to bring us up to date with the latest, large and small examples of corruption at work in India. What have you got for us this time? Well, Andy Helen, this is quite a sad, sort of, pandemic economic story. A Mumbai man has allegedly been cheated, cheated 15,000 pounds for trying to work as a male escort. So a 40-year-old man from Mumbai was duped to 15,000 pounds after being load by fraudsters to become a male escort.

Now, he was charged a lot of money by an agency who promised him work every evening. However, he claimed he was not provided any job. And in return, he alleged that they took 15,000 pounds from him under the pretext of registration fees. The man worked as a tailor and told the police that he got drawn to the offer as his tailoring unit had shut down and so he thought about becoming a jiggle-o, we've all been there.

I was quite taken by that because I belong to an association, Andy Helen, of Mumbai Screenwriters, which is a shambolic perhaps criminal organisation that promises minimum wages and health insurance, but we haven't managed a registration book or a registration fees. So I was quite taken by the fact that male escorts have a registered body. Turns out they don't, this was fraud and corruption. However, this is led to a big debate in India about where such a body is necessary. And a number of people have signed this petition, notably three male escorts and one tailor. Never pay fees up front. It's a great point.

Museums news. Now, well, this has been a story that's rumbled on through the year. The latest that the British government has warned museums not to take down statues or exhibits under pressure from what they describe as the PC brigade. They want to stop museums rewriting the version of history that we've previously rewritten. It was let us sent from the Secretary of State for a culture media and sport, Oliver Dowden, laying out the government's position in which he said, and in something of an

understatement, history is written with moral complexity, statues and other historical objects were created by generations with different perspectives and understandings of right and wrong. So what's... It's not a great argument like lack of, you know, medical treatment with no anesthetic was created by previous generations and we don't seem to have continued that in surgery. Yeah, and look at the state of the country now. You know, massively overcrowded by people who would rightly have died in botched surgery, where it not for the PC brigade insisting that we make medical advances. Right, Anastasia makes a load of soft boys. I think Donald Trump has basically said that in the past. Helen, Andy, I have a question about this whole statue museum debate.

And, you know, I hold a special place in my heart for a number of statues that for some reason of British people have shown up in India. I don't know how this happened, but it seems to be strewn across the country. Now, my English is not very strong, but Prime Minister Boris Johnson was asked the reason perhaps some of these statues need to be moved to a colonial museum is that you could write down that some of the things these people did were mistakes. And he responded by saying, it depends on how you define mistake. So I just wanted your view on that or whether are there several definitions of mistake?

Well, I mean, it's very difficult when we look back on the history of the British Empire to, you know, work out what was a mistake, what was a blooper technically, what was a procedural snorfoo. What was a whoopsadaisy? Yeah, exactly a whoopsadaisy. A whoopsadaisy, I think, is anything with below 1000 casualties. That's an official whoopsadaisy. Above 1000 you're getting into a kerfuffle I believe. So what did they mean the mistake was India's for being in the way when

the British decided they wanted it? Exactly. I mean Donald Trump would see it as a weakness really, just putting up any sort of fight. So all of a doubt and says that these exhibits and statues play an important role in teaching us about our past. I'm trying to think if I've ever been taught anything by a statue, because usually looking at a statue of a 19th century military general just makes me feel kind of bored and angry, but not necessarily informed. Yes.

If they put up a statue of Wikipedia, then that might work better. Right. But then the letter... I don't know. I mean, probably look good, Andy. But, you know, a lotitty, it wouldn't look good Andy, but you know, a lot of these generals don't look good. But they sent this to 26 museums including the Imperial War Museum, National Portrait Gallery,

V&A and Arts Council and National Lottery Heritage Fund with the threat, I would say, the veil threat saying, the significant support you receive from the taxpayer is acknowledgement of the important cultural role you play for the entire country. I suppose you could say propaganda stroll if you disagree with cultural. It is imperative that you continue to act impartially in line with your publicly funded status

and not in a way that brings us into question. So it's basically, keep the path and non-marbles or else you take your funder away. Funder is a way. Also, I mean, you tried to define mistake. What about impartiality? Is it impartial to have all the shit that we plundered from other places? Is it impartial to have statues of like this bunch of f***s instead of other people? What made you just wondering about a word? I mean it's possible that that could be a way to balance these things out. You know if we keep these statues of, you know, we talked about it before, the likes of Robert Clive at Hanoi Wabanae.

We talked on a radio 4 series a couple of years ago, the statue of Clive that was erected almost 150 years after he died in complete disgrace as we attempted to rewrite our history to make him look like less of a massive f***. So I don't know where the impartiality on, can you be impartial on Robert Clive, Anuva? Well, you know, I've slightly led by the fact that under the statue still sitting in front of the foreign office sits the words Clive of India. But I have a slight reason for that. Where's the man Clive on India?

Like the sort of rampage on India. That's more accurate, right? Because he showed up and sat on it. But the interesting thing is that I have a contrary in view to this because the historian William Dalribble has been sort of going on and on lately and anyone who's here about tearing down that statue and saying, Clive was a walk criminal, etc.

But in sort of defense of him, what better statue to have to show the beginning of British foreign policy than clive at the mouth of the foreign office? I mean, there's a true student, right, of British history. I think it begins with 1757 and clive. So he is indeed in the right place. Because what was behind him was previously in the India office, and after independence, all those papers got burnt. Everyone was like, oh, this didn't happen. And it became now what is the foreign communal office. So I think he's in a good place because he shows you where

it began, how it began, with a tiny bit of loot, and what has become now. I guess so. And in terms of learning, people learning from it, you can learn, I'm not sure I don't know how much you can learn from the statue of Clive. I think you can learn quite a lot from what the pigeons have done to the statue of Clive.

In many ways, that's the more pertinent part of that scum. I mean, without putting Clive there, we wouldn't have given the pigeons the opportunity to shit on his head. So, in many ways, full outdoor statues have an inbuilt natural impartiality, but we glorify these people, and the end of this week's Bugle. I hope, I don't know, it's getting increasingly hard to know what to say at the end of a topical, spherical new show. I hope things don't get much shitter over the next week. Will that do? What was it that used to say at the end of Crime Watch? Don't have nightmares. Yes, I mean what they should have said is remember this is a statistically insignificant sample. Yes, okay, well don't have nightmares, don't have nightmares, beugles, other than the ones

you have when watching the telly or reading the news. Thank you very much for listening. Annie, how many shows you'd like to alert our listeners to? Well, it's more of a anecdote from the thing I'm doing. I'm doing a comedy writing workshop for the last six weeks, Andy, and we're hoping to have a noted IPL commentator and his ultimate join us. If you do it every Sunday, but the most interesting thing is, at the end of the workshop, I do a Q&A, and last week when a student said, this thing that you're teaching, will this profession ever come back?

What? Oh yes, or the bleak future of comedy. Under attack not only from COVID and the economic devastation related to it, but also from the fact that the universe is no longer amusing. Helen, tell our listeners all about your various shows where they can hear. Well, I have three podcasts. Answer me this. We're on a commas investigations and the illusionist, which is about language, and I just put out an episode with the horrific origins of the word bulldozer. So if you want to feel even worse about voter suppression, I suggest you listen to that. And then we want to start calling them earth movers. Well, what if we want to feel better about voter suppression? I don't know, have you got a show for

that? I'm afraid I do not make a show for that. Right, that's why you don't do so much on the BBC because you're not balanced enough. The Barrier! Thank you for listening, Bughlers. We'll be back next week with the latest exciting instalments of the history of the planet Earth. Goodbye. To conclude this week's show, hear us some more lies about our premium level bugle voluntary subscribers. To join the Bugle voluntary subscription scheme and make a one-off or recurring

donation to the show, go to the buglepodcast.com and click the donate button. Patrick Stewart, not that one, thought that the term Delica Tesson was spelled as the word Delicate, followed by the letters S and N, which he assumed stood for the words Snacks and Nibbles. In fact, Patrick briefly had a sideline as a rapper, specializing in fine foods themed hip hop under the name Delic A Tesson, spelled deapostrophe LICK8SN. When his debut single, you're in Salami now, sampling status quo's hits on You're in the Army now, resulted in a court case he retired from showbiz. Similarly, Ian Findlater, another etymological confusing, thought the term horoscope was

made up of the words horrors and cope. Ian explains, I assumed it was weakly advice, to guide you on how to manage to deal with the horrors of life, but then I read some and I have to say I was unimpressed on both counts, disappointingly vague squared. Joining the list of VBVs, vocabulary bewilderment victims, Dan Randall used to misread the word specimen as specky men and assumed it was a word that highlighted the male dominance and prevalent Goggle usage in the world of scientific research in the early 20th century. Archie Wade is never that impressed by those tortoises that people say have been alive for about 180

years. What have they actually done in that time asks Archie? Tortises have a tendency to live very much in their own comfort zone, and species need to do more than that to impress me. I've got a busy life, and I've only got time to impress by 15, maybe 20 different species. Chris Holland still has not given up hope that the crew and passengers, who disappeared from the Mary Celesthip in 1872, might still turn up alive and well. It's a bit of a long shot admittedly, says Chris, but it is possible that they found a secret island of eternal life and have been hanging out there getting hammered and playing poker in the nude ever since. I reckon the novelty of that would probably wear

off after 148 to 150 years, so if they are going to come back, concludes Chris, I reckon it will be soon. And finally, British N would prefer football if the goal was not an eight yard by 8 foot rectangle enclosed by post and a crossbar, but was instead a similarly shaped and sized stack of champagne glasses. British justifies this hope by saying, I think it would make the moment a goal is scored just that bit more spectacular, and it would also make goalkeepers try a lot harder as well. Here end it this week's lies, from me at least I'm sure there will

be other lies, from other sources to keep you going until next time. Bye bye!