The Bugle - After Iowa, only 302 days left to go

Episode Date: January 7, 2008

The 11th ever Bugle podcast, from 2008. Written and presented by Andy Zaltzman and John OliverThis is a classic episode from The Bugle, to support us, and to keep the Bugle alive and free of ads, please visit http://thebuglepodcast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Audio newspaper for a visual world. Hello and welcome to the first ever bugle of 2008 it's issue 11 of the bugle that's nothing including issue 10 a it's issue 11 for the week beginning the seventh of January with me and his ultimate in London and in New York City John Oliver happy new year worlds happy new, although I realized in the current climates that could sound a little sarcastic Yes, it is a New Year. We are all one new miracle year closer to the anylating chasm of death But on the positive side some sections of the bugle as always are going straight in the bin, including a special eating supplement with new ideas on how to bite, chew and swallow a range of foods from raw cabbage, all the way to the latest celebrity chef recipe, frightened lobster and an abusive

snout sauce. Also in the bin the bugle's audio calendar, sadly Tom R. Producer hadn't heard about Britain adopting the Gregorian calendar to replace the old Julian calendar back in 1752. There he is. Still excited about Christmas. Review of the year 2008. So Andy, I mean, I guess it's time now to look back on the year 2008 and Really try and put it in some kind of context how have you found 2008 to be well, it's been low grade so far John I had so many high hopes for 2008. You know, it's the first year whose numbers add up to 10 since the year 1900 So I was really

looking forward to it on those grounds, if nothing else. But it's not started well, it's been kind of like a football match when your star player has scored an own goal in the first minute and then been sent off for urinating on the referee. That's how I see 2008 so far. I thought the British and their tendency towards binge drinking really started the year as they meant to go on as a report told us that on New Year's Eve there was a call to an ambulance every eight seconds. What better way to ring in the New Year than with virtual self annihilation?

In history and the early Babylonians would celebrate New Year by returning borrowed farm equipment. The ancient Greeks would parade around with a baby in a basket to symbolise new life. Hindus paid respect to their elders and sought their blessings. And now look at us, we're more likely to wake up in Nottingham General Hospital with a stomach pump in our mouth. And that's a bad start of the year, unless your new year's resolution was waking up in more hospitals, which case are I staying corrected. Good start.

All in all, John, with the year so far, oil hitting $100 a barrel, chaos around the world, the environment's already failed in its new year resolution to be absolutely fine again. Rail chaos in Britain. Really, I'd give this year one star, and I would advise anyone currently living in it to get out of it as quickly as possible. What, just get out of the world. Get out of the year and come back at the start of next year and hope it's a better one. Well, hibernation, is that what you've advised? Well, if you're watching a bad film, you leave. No, I think you do the same in 2008. Wrong, and I did not have that attitude

towards films. Any film, if I've started it, I will see that film through. I will not be beaten by a film. Even Teen Wolf 2. Especially Teen Wolf 2, and that was not a bad film, so I don't know, that's a bad reference. Top story this week, and what could well become the highlight of the year, is the big race to the biggest prize in world politics is underway. By the end of 2008, America should have a 44th president, although let's not count our chickens just yet. The US election has begun, the Iowa caucus was recently completed and it is estimated that each candidate will have spent around $200 per vote in Iowa. And by the end of the year, over $1 billion will have been spent manipulating the true will of the people. That is platinum democracy, Andy.

America are about to get a lot of bang for their devalued buck. So the race is on to become the 4040s president and also the winner of a commemorative silver salver. In the early running, Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee have been jointly elected president of Iowa. John, what signals does this give for the rest of the race? Perhaps you can just inform me and everyone else in Britain who literally doesn't understand how this ridiculous process works. What does this signify? Is there anyone in America who understands how it works as well?

Because there are 302 days to go, as we broadcast on the 7th of January, 302 days to go until the election. Now if you mention the number 302 to most British people like me, they'd probably say, well, that's West Indian stylist Lawrence Rose High's Test Match score. But... I'll put God's sake. Two other people, of course. 302 is... Well, it's the year that Gregory the illuminator was consecrated as the Patriarch of Armenia.

I mean, it's interesting to think what that sentence would have been before the invention of the internet. It would have been just a pause out of just been twiddling a pen. 302 days. And now how can America stand 300 days of electioneering? And in Britain we get three weeks, but it's on the entire nation, it's standing on a high ledge, screaming, someone, please, just make the wittering stop. Because America wants to enjoy its election, and it's like a fine meal you don't wolf it down in

one go. You have a little bite of something, have a conversation, enjoy another little bite of something and then have another course. Britain doesn't know how to do democracy Andy. John that's a bit rich from someone who on New Is Eve., I shall look at a steak tartar with a mixture of fear and apprehension as to what the future held and push it gently to the side of his plate. Yeah, but you should know that I went to Andy's house for a New Year's Eve and Andy likes serving adventurous food. There are a couple of adventures too far from the John Oliver there. Steak tartar being amongst them. It just needs cooking. Anyway when it comes to culinary adventures,

you're very much Captain Scott's friend who said I'll tell you what guys I'm going to stay on the boat. Who lived to tell the tale? But the Corker system is a little difficult to get your head around, but it essentially neighbours gather together in town halls and often people's houses and talk for an evening before voting on their candidate of choice. It's like selecting a leader with a tea party and a man makes that hasn't caught on in Britain. What better representative sample of one of the most multicultural nations on earth than Iowa? The mood of the nation set by less than 300,000 white protestant farmers. It's an up, close and personal form of politics, this Andy. Candidates are forced

to go to all corners of Iowa and New Hampshire and often go door to door campaigning. This really separates the men from the other men. How badly do you want to be president, Andy? Will you sit through some 73 year old man's diatribe against Mexicans and how the moon landing was faked, was pretending to like his wife's homemade corn muffins Do you really want this job? Many are fallen at this stage Roosevelt once proclaimed a homemade peach cobbler like eating a decaying pigeon before demonstrating exactly where the lady could stick her Vote that took a lot of coming back from right he came back from it John and that's that's the important thing I'll be it he never walked again

It has thrown up some big shocks though the Iowa caucus and the breakthrough candidate in recent weeks has been Mike Huckabee who has struck a chord with his progressive ideas amongst them the fact that he doesn't believe in evolution, thinks people with aides should essentially be imprisoned and is equated homosexuality with necrophilia. It's Huckabee going to have the funds to go all the way down? Cause it does cost more according to reports to run a US election campaign than it would to send a life-size replica of Mexico to Saturn.

I believe that that's one of Tom Tancredo's promises if elected. He's trying different formats in terms of gaining support. Like he was joined on stage throughout the Iowa campaigning by Chuck Norris. Now you might be thinking oh there must be another Chuck Norris, maybe a professor of politics somewhere or a lesson-owned senator, there's no way he'd take a

kung fu star on stage with him in a presidential primary. Well I'm afraid you're wrong, it's that Chuck Norris, from way of the dragon and silent rage, him. I hear he is being lined up for a post as the secretary of state should I could be win yeah which you know you might just pack a bit more a bit more punch than Condoleezza Rice what really that he's spoken of a true man who has never seen Condoleezza Rice punch a wall now I was very sad to see that Christopher Dodd's campaign is already over. What, what does he brought to the party?

Well, I mean it's hard to say, I guess the most moment of Chris Dodd's in the US election so far was that a fly landed on his head at joining one of the debates and it stayed there and he's got very white hair. Unfortunately, I can't even remember what he was talking about. It's hard to see how anyone could come back from something like that in this day and age. So much about image. It just stayed on his head. This little fly and whatever he was talking about at the time, he just thought, oh look, there's a fly on Christod's head. Really? At that point, I thought that man is never going to be present. What chance does Michael do khakis have this time? Oh I thought he deserved a crack at the

big one. Well yeah I mean as much chances he had last time. Is he still alive? Do khakis? Yeah. Oh well tell you what Andy do you want this to be the first challenge of the new year? Is do khakis still alive? What do we want our listeners who have outsideed Ducaques? Can you confirm whether or not Michael Ducaques exists? No, this is this is me and you Andy. No, no, man. Ducaques are live or dead. You'll call call it. Like heads or tails. I think he's still alive. Okay, I'll take dead. Right. Tom the producer. Come on. Is on the job. Oh, I don't want to be I don't want to be saying come on, do Kakis, cork it. What's the news? Do Kakis living or buried? He's alive! Do Kakis, very much still breathing in oxygen.

aged 74 doesn't look a day older. Bad start. Bad news for John Oliver, the news for the Dakarkis family. So if there's anyone else in the world of world politics you'd like John and I to speculate on whether or not they still exist just email into the bugle at timesonline.co.uk and we will trivialize the lives of people who achieve far more than either of us ever will. But of course, in 2008, it's not just America that is enjoying the fruits of democracy. It's the year of the vote around the world, but it's not started very well. The Pakistani election has already been postponed. The outcome of the Kenyan election is being very vigorously disputed.

All in all, democracy is taking an old fashion shooing all around the world and Malaysian health minister has had to resign after being caught starring in a pornographic video. The Honduran foreign minister has quit after being caught drink driving. John, do you think there will still be any democracy by the end of the year? I think democracy is going perfectly well around the world Andy. That is if you're watching the West Wing and not the news otherwise it is a typhoon of shit. It's not looking good for democracy at the moment. I mean Benazio Bouta was assassinated of course with seemingly depressing

inevitability. Although in terms of the investigation it's good that the British police are now involved. Musteraph made a request to Scotland Yard for a team of detectives and his request was granted. We've actually performed similar services to Pakistan in the past, with investigations over the assassinations of Prime Minister Ali Khan in 1951 and Mutta Tsobuto in 1996. Neither case has been fully resolved, so it's nice of Pakistan to give us another chance, presumably under the third time lucky-printable. Yeah, well, yeah, those three strikes, and we are out. And it's also good as well that Pakistan

has remembered in this time of crisis, the role that Britain played in leaving it in the mess, which it currently faces. And so it's only right that we should play a part in trying to fix at least a small part of that mess. You could say that I've almost any nation on the earth though. Andy, Kenya, that was, that was ours. That was ours.

This is the worst thing since declaring independence. We left that in a real mess as well. But the PVP has now been headed by Boutos 19 year old son who is currently a student at Oxford University and TNA just do think they can do anything. This will be an interesting experiment into whether they're right or not. Do you think you could have united the turbulent country at 19? Well John, I was a student out for when I was 19 and to be honest I struggled to get myself dressed in the morning. So I think

running a country would have been a big task and probably a task that I would have done half dressed if at all. To do that, you know, certainly would have been a great thing to have on your CV. Yeah. No, I see here under other experience that you pulled Pakistan back from the brink of chaos. Do you have any other hobbies? But you know, you sign up for all kinds of things when you first get to university You know, join the film society never really watch any films. I sign up to be leader of Pakistan So in terms of democracy perhaps we can turn to the success story of Africa for a smooth simple election Whoops. No. Opposition leader mr. Ader refused to tell people to calm down in Kenya, saying,

I'll refuse to be asked to give the Kenyan people an anesthetic so that they can be rakes. Which is interesting, I suppose. Lucky then, that he's not being asked to administer a rape anesthetic to his people. He's just being asked to tell them to calm down. Should the issue of rape anesthetics ever arise, now we know what his position is. But for now, a simple calm down will suffice. Has he ever worked as a doctor? What a maverick one. Other African nations looked to Kenya to set an example, and in with Angola,

Malawi and Ghana all set for elections in the next 18 months. Africa's already unstable future is looking even unstable. And the foreign office in Britain finally warned against non-essential travel, plunging hundreds of holidays into chaos. And that's the real tragedy, of course, here Andy, that rich white tourists won't be able to chase after a leopard in a jeep. Their story is not being told here,

and I intend to tell it. The foreign office advised Trigger to rush of radio phonons in Britain about to what extent travel insurance would cover this lost holiday. And it takes real balls to hold a phone in about safari travel insurance the day after children have been burnt to death in the church. Real balls. Pope appoints exorcists.

In other news, the Pope has ordered his bishops to set up exorcism squads to combat a rise in satanism. Who said the church wasn't relevant anymore? It's the Vatican Jesus so concerned that the perceived interest in the occult. They are fighting occult with occult. Just to get everyone's feet back on the ground, just believing in good old fat and Jesus Christ again. Each bishop has been told to have in his diocese a number of priests trained to fight demonic possession. And that is a relief because it's a good deterrent, it's like a burglar alarm. It just deters demons from trying to possess you.

I believe he's going to demand that every town has a vampire slayer as well. Good for him. The Vatican's exorcist in chief, Father Amor lamented the fact that, and I quote, you have to search high and low for a properly trained exorcist. That is so true. But they're very hard to come by a good exorcist these days John. I look through the yellow pages the other day because we thought for a while that our little daughter might have might have been possessed by the devil turns out she's had a cough. But we're trying to get an exorcist. There's no independent board that regulates exorcists in Britain. You know, they've all got these fake certificates.

You don't know who to trust anymore. I would like the Catholic Church to go further than this and set up online exorcisms and a kind of NHS Direct Style exorcism phone service from a call centre in Rome. Do you think they could talk you through your own home-based exorcism then, just whaggle some rosemary around and chant? Yes, kind of like an emergency tracheotomy, which we've all done at some point or other, so I don't think an exorcism can be that much more difficult. Father Gabriel also went on to say, thanks be to God, we have a Pope who has decided to fight the devil head on.

That is a paper view I would pay to view. The Pope versus the devil. In a cage match, two things enter. One thing leaves. It's just been so much trash talking over the years, isn't it? Centuries and centuries. I wonder if the Pope's getting a bit cocky though now that he's signed up Tony Blair and big money transfer. I know Blair is kind of like Beckham joining L.A. Galaxy. Yeah, he's at the end of his career, but he's still a big name. Yeah, he's big name.

And, uh, yeah, the Pope's on it. Just been a bit jaunty since then. And this year 2008 it's happy 60th birthday to the National Health Service. Happy birthday, many happy returns. Amongst the plan celebrations are a celebrity concert at which world's famous stars of pop and rock are singing special songs out there experiences with the NHS, including Elton Johns, hit single, I went to see my GP with backpains turned out I had an abdominal cyst. Is it the tune of Good Boy Yellow Brick Road? John, what are you getting the NHS for its birthday? Well, I've already bought the NHS of present Andy, I bought it my taxes again this year. It's a bit same you but it seems to like it and need it. I bought it a digital photo frame you know these things you get where you put a second pull it's favorite X-rays right a little

rotation. That's nice yeah. But yet 60 years old this year and a just five years from its inevitable forced retirement and it doesn't look 60 it looks 104 has it really been 60 years since Nibbeth and held the NHS in his arms what a proud father he was that day Andy and how proud he'd be now of his decaying crumbling underfunded child people have queued up to wish the NHS well, actually I think many of the longest queues were for vital surgery, but I'm sure they wish the NHS well too. In fact, they might wish it well the most. NHS still, in American sports parlance, batting over 500 in terms of saves to deaths, as long as you've got more than a half chance

of coming out alive from hospital, I think we'd all take that, John. I'll take that. And amongst famous people to have used the NHS, Mick Jagger and Ian Boatham. Of course, not just the NHS celebrating birthdays, in fact, Joan of Arc would have been 596 yesterday, had she not died 577 years ago. So happy birthday Joan Happy birthday Joan. I believe the French claims that Joan of Arc's death was in fact a birthday celebration What's here blow it out Joan make a wish

Now your emails. Thank you for continuing to send in a Now your emails! Thank you for continuing to send in a cavalcade of spectacular emails from which here is a selection. Gabriel Reed sent in perhaps the most alarming email we've received since the last edition of the bugle on the subject of Hotties in History. Can I just state that this does seem now to have, as I feared at the time, acquired a momentum of its own? Brace yourselves, listeners, forort Gabriel has to say. I would like to bring up for your consideration a hot-y from history that I think is often overlooked. Margaret Fatcher. No, come on, no way. Not so much the whole package, brackets, which I might add, wasn't too shabby. Just a single part of it. It was too shabby.

John, I think you're allowing your disagreement with her political policies to overshadow an objective assessment of her womanly virtues. But just a single part of her rights, Gabriel, her elbows. I was one of those lucky enough to see her selling herself at Berlin Gap Beach in 1989. And I can honestly say she instituted a poll tax in my pants. What a run of absolutely reprehensible mental images to place into people's minds.

Gabriel, I hope your parents are proud of you. But in honour of all of you who've sent in your hoties from history, next week we will be beginning a special,irelli style calendar of Hothys from history at the suggestion of Tom of Friggy. We will be doing that. We will. That is something we won't be doing. So we will be doing. So if you've got any recommendations for who should be Miss January or Miss January let's give us open. Two centimeters. Let's do that. That does sound fair. Mr and Mrs. January, we'll do this all year. Also technically we can't allow that to because the hottest mystery are supposed to be dead.

Otherwise it's creepy. For those of you who have written in with great concern that John was caught on YouTube smoking a cigarette, we have checked the offending footage and it remains ambiguous to me, John. It's not ambiguous. It's not ambiguous. It was absolutely not smoking, Andy. There is nothing in my hand. I can't believe we're getting dragged down. If you freeze it, you'll see there's nothing in my hand. I'm just amiming a cigarette due to a point I was making. It was probably a good point about something statistically. And you usually back those up with mimes of smoking. Yeah, because if I ever make a good point, I'm mime smoking.

It's just a reflex. If you make a really good point, you go for the big cigar or maybe a pipe. Absolutely, I'll go for the big cigar. And if I make an incredible point, of course, it's the pipe. Right. What about the hooker?

Do you ever get that out? I've never made a point that good. Testify. Love the word hooker. We'll never know one way or other way, John was awoken. We will. Until I take my word for it. Maybe, well let's see if you've died of lung cancer at some point in the next 80 years and then we'll judge. Okay. So keep listening.

My favourite email, Andy, was the first and only supporter of your audio crossword. It says, dear John and Andy, as a loyal bugle listener these many weeks, I'm deeply concerned about the future of your pioneering audio cryptic crossword. It seems that John is not very keen on continuing the crossword into 2008. It does seem that way because that is the case. I'm not keen on doing it. But please, let me tell you what the audio cryptic crossword

means to your listeners. Well, it means nothing. Anyway, it means everything, John. It does not mean everything. It means literally nothing. The bugle in its current form is all things to all people. It's with, I can't even read out the contents. They might be filled with.

If you were to eliminate the audio cryptic crossword, however, the bugle would be all things to only about 99.872% of all people. For the remaining 0.128% of us, well done, the bugle would be incomplete. If it would make John happy, you could move the crossword to the straight in the bin section. That would make me happy.

That way, those of us who still want to do the crossword could pull it out of the bin, brush off the audio coffee grinds and work around the stains. And they keep up the good work. Sherry Garfio from Denver. Oh, does that explain you? Thanks for your support, Sherry. Thanks for your support. Oh, not only am I going to stick with the audio cryptic crossword, but I'm thinking of expanding

it and introducing an audio sedoku as well. This finally, time for one quick email, it's from Derek Crosby and he writes, dear Gents, who do you think would win in a fight, a tag team of Benjamin, Disraeli and Ian Paisley or a tag team of Stonewall Jackson and Abraham? I'm very much going with the Disraeli Paisley team on the ground. Oh, interesting. Paisley is the only one still alive. So do keep your emails coming in the bugle at times online.co.uk and because so many have been coming in, we will be instituting a bugle blog to a company of the podcasts which will contain the best of the rest of the emails that we didn't have time for in the show with our responses to them. So keep them coming in, the bugle at times

online.co.uk. Sport now and it's the start of a new year and Europe is all a flatter at the prospect of it being a European championship year. The European football championship will happen in Switzerland and Austria in the summer. Who do you think is going to win John? Me, for me it's got to be England. I know it's my heart. It's ruling my head but surely with this such a talented group of players and a really good new manager in Capello They're gonna be very hard to beat Got to be England Andy. I'll be supporting England wholeheartedly from over here England for Euro 2008. Don't listen to what the critics say believe in your team

We can't naysay at this stage. They can do it What's other predictions do you have for the sporting year? they can do it. What's other predictions do you have for the sporting year? Well, I mean in terms of the next sport to be rocked by a drug scandal, Cricket and I think Cricket is going to be rocked by a drug scandal, I think it's going to turn out they're all on tranquilizers. Not watching Jack Callis bat. Jack Callis just seems overly calm. So I think the average level of strenuousness of denial will rise to a record level of 2.3 landesses that is the new official unit of measurement for how strenuously you deny taking drugs.

And I think the Olympics are really going to push that up as well. Also in the Olympics I think one thing we can confidently predict is that Britain will give a flying f*** about rowing for about two days. Correct. Let's hope in 2008 that the Miami Dolphins can go one step further than they managed in 2007 when they choked so close to their historic season. History beckoned and as always it's just one thing to get there there It's another thing to finish it off and the dolphins sadly won a game I I hear the NFL so encouraged by the Bugles championing of the Miami dolphins But they're introducing playoffs for the worst teams in the league

Next year good idea. I'm gonna have a shit bowl on the day before the Super Bowl To work up who is the worst thing bowl on the day before the Super Bowl. It's a workup, who is the worst thing. The nominal idea. It really should be a bowl of shit the prize as well. The franchise owner has the hoist over his head. And now it's time for the aforementioned bugle audio cryptic crossword section, a section which has won more awards than the lot of you put together in the audio cryptic crossword field. The more eagerly had listeners amongst you will have noticed that in issue 10 of the bugle

we actually repeated a clue from earlier in the series. This was due to a technical error in which the last five minutes of the last recording were wiped off the tape before. No one noticed. Why is noticed. No one noticed. No one has told us they noticed. I think people were probably a little embarrassed to say, hang on guys, we already had this clue a few weeks ago. I probably thought, look, it's Christmas, they're probably having a terrible time feeling awfully guilty about it. Let's not rub it in. People don't care. How, how more clear can it be? No one wants the audio crossword.

John, audio critic crossword is like freedom, John. You don't appreciate it until it's gone. You know how it's called it is. Try me just for one week. So anyway, here is the clue that you should have got last time, pay attention. That includes you, John. Have you got any of them right so far?

I haven't even thought about it. I would pro-tool about it. I would pro-tool about it. Me think the Lady Duff protest too much. It's 25 across. It's seven letters long split into two words of two and five. And the clue is, working on time leads to headless Blair being overthrown and facing justice. Two-five. Your cynicism tires me, John. And finally, the Bugle Forecast.

This week, a fashion forecast. I predict this week, we're going to see a lot of people wearing trousers. The trousers are really going to maintain their comeback. They're going to, you know, they're a solid item of clothing, very seldom that you know. Well, I think we're going to see a lot of flip flops around. In the winter. Well that's it for the first bugle of 2008 so we'll be back next week. Keep your emails

coming in to the bugle at timesonline.co.uk, particularly those houghty small history. No not particularly though. Anyways been a pleasure talking to you. Bye! Good bye, everybody. And maybe a preemptive hello for next week. Thank you.