The Bugle - Bugle 287 – Ecuadoh!

Episode Date: February 20, 2015

John has the latest on his beef with Ecuador, and a Ukraine update. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Hello, Bugles and welcome to a very special issue 297 of The Bugle, because this week we come to you not from one continent, as we seldom do anyway. Not from two continents, as we normally do. Not from four continents, which would be a logistical shipburg, but from three continents, Chris is holding the fort in the crumbling edifice of Europe and I and his ultraman, I'm in Australasia or as the Australians call it, Australia but I'm in the bit of Australia out in the ocean called New Zealand. And still hold up claiming creative asylum in the USA, it's the satirical Salad Spinner himself, whisking the moisture of malfeasance of the legislative lettuce leaves, it's John Oliver. talent spinn'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n'n' It's touching on every part of the global day. Breakfast time for me, lunch time for Chris, midnight snack time for Andy.

I'm munching on oatmeal, Chris is munching on the sandwich, and I'll presume that Andy has an entire lobster hanging out the corner of his mouth right now. I hope everyone's had a good couple of weeks. I've had a slightly weird time, not just because we've been trying to get the show back on air, but also because in doing that, I seem to have got involved in my first high profile beef. Tupac had Biggie and the 50 cent had Jarul. Jay-Z had Nas, and I seem to have President of Ecuador Rafael Carrier.

Let me explain. We did a piece on our first show back about how over sensitive he is. After he went so far as to call out by nine people on Twitter on Facebook who criticized him and encouraged his followers to attack them online. Now, for what I knew of him, Andy, which is very little, I didn't anticipate him taking that well or indeed enjoying it in any shape or form. I was not, however, expecting him to completely lose his shit and spend the entire next week shit talking me on Twitter because that, amazingly, is exactly what happened. The president of Ecuador, Andy, a man who, to put it mildly, needs to stop Googling himself

or, at the very least, have someone take his phone away from him. The president of Ecuador went on a Twitter spree saying that the term English comedian was an oxymoron that I was an idiot who probably thought the capital of Ecuador was koala lumpur. And finally saying this, and I quote, regarding John Oliver, too much noise for such little nuts. Now, now, that is an expression, I believe,

over there, which means something won't be the lies of much to do about nothing. But you can't escape in translation. You can't help but think that a world leader has just publicly stated that I have tiny balls, Andy. You can't that. There was even a campaign set up by someone apparently married to a government official saying, hashtag, john you are invited, arguing that I should come to Ecuador to see what it was like there, which I'd love to do Andy. The only problem is, I know a trap when I see one. They're trying to lure me over there with their majestic sea turtles and their oxygen-free air, Andy. But it's not going to work because me and my tiny nuts are staying here where we're all safe, all three of us.

Well, I think maybe you should give it a go, John, because the capital, I forgot it's called the Kuala-Kuala-Something, I think, is about,, 3,000 meters above sea level. And of course, up at that altitude, your nuts would swell up to an acceptable size. And that's how hot hair balloons work, I think. So give it a go. So, I mean, what's the next step? I mean, do we need to stop mobilizing bugle forces to gather on the borders of Ecuador? I mean, that's the problem. I mean, this is normally how it works. Isn't it an escalation of words? And and then eventually there's a military standoff and then there's military

force deployed. So we've done the words bit. I guess it's me against the Ecuadorian military now. Well you've got HBO, they made band of brothers didn't they? I must have some of that. They do, yeah, exactly. I guess I've got a mixture between using HBO's resources, which would be a sprinkling of Second World troops, Ivan Drago and Omar from the wire, except the last two of those are dead, of course, as indeed was the first one. So anyway, where they go. Sorry there was no full bugle last week, that was due to an unfortunate

collision of the unstoppable march of time and diplomatic incident with Ecuador, it seems when were those two just bury the hatchet and learn to get along. I'm now in Christchurch, New Zealand, which City took the wrong end of an argument of plate tectonics four years ago, which gradually rebuilding. Thankfully it's prioritised its cricket ground which are now up and running ready for a couple of world cup games this weekend. Building a cricket ground not necessarily top of everyone's priority lists of post-earthquake particularly those who are waiting for I'll be more important things to be rebuilt first for example their houses but

it shows that this is my kind of town. I've got a taxi down to my gig in Christchurch and thanks to all those buglers who came along and the taxi driver was telling me a story about how just after the earthquake she'd been in the taxi driving her taxi, picked someone up in the airport and they said of course you know why this earthquake happened it's because the city of Christchurch is no longer a Christian city. There are too many sins. Um, and that's actually driver told me that she had replied by saying, well, how do you explain that the mosque was fine?

And then the person who's having this conversation with just kind of shut up. And then that's actually driver said to me, the thing is, I had absolutely no idea what had happened to the mosque, but it seemed to shut their up. So there we go. There's a lesson for everyone in there. I think that's basically how religion started in the first place to go. This is Bugle 287 and 287, this is coincidentally the 287th year since 1728 which was of course 42 years before Captain Cook arrived in Australia or New Zealand no one really knows which. Top story this week, more pain in the Ukraine. Crazy insane, got more pain.

The week started so well and on Sunday a ceasefire came into effect in Ukraine which sounds so great in principle. There was only one explosive problem with that and that's that either nobody told the people in eastern Ukraine about it or they're having a little bit of trouble with the cease-part of cease-fire. Firing is not the problem, Andy. They've proven they know how to do that loudly and often. It's the cessation part which is proving tricky. Perhaps they felt that it counters a cease-fire if you cease-fire for the duration of time that it takes to reload. The point is, things are currently so bad

that NATO's top military commander said the cease fire currently exists in name only. And of course the only problem with that is it means it doesn't fucking exist at all, doesn't it? That logic does not apply anywhere else. Try telling a 10-year-old that their birthday cake exists in name only. Good luck with that. That's an that their birthday cake exists in name only. Good luck with that.

That's an Amy. The cake exists in principle. It just hasn't taken tangible form yet. But hold back and it'll happen. Just blow on the table in front of you for now and make the best of it, okay? Happy birthday. Stop crying. Of course, as always, right at the centre of this is your friend and my Vladimir Putin.

Sturring the shit in the international cauldron for far too long now. And I've got a quick step by step guide, John, to when to trust Vladimir Putin. Question one, is Vladimir Putin breathing? If yes, do not trust Vladimir Putin. Question one, is Vladimir Putin breathing? If yes, do not trust Vladimir Putin. If no, give it 40 years and you might be okay. So I hope that will help put things forward a bit. At the fighting continued this week as Russia, Ukraine, France and Germany held more talks over the phone. And I guess the only problem with that is that it's going to be hard for you, Crater, hear what's going on on that conference call with all the fucking shelling going on in

the background. What's that? How's the ceasefire going? I'll tell you what, let me hold my phone up to where my window used to be. Did you hear that? Does that answer your stupid fucking question? As you say, John, the other two countries involved were Germany and France. I suppose if you want to talk to two countries that really, really know the dangers of allowing

a little local skirmish to spiral significantly out of control, those are the two best countries to have at your table. The ceasefire or the Minsk agreement was supposed to take place from one minute after midnight on the 15th of February, but all that seemed to achieve was to get people to fight even harder in the lead up to the deadline. It was like last orders being called a bar in England. You're basically incidents of binge bombing up and down Eastern Ukraine before someone was supposed to ring a bell and say,

time, please, gentlemen, that is time. Weapons down, please, gentlemen. you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here. Time, please, that's time. And look, and I'm not saying that this agreement was doomed from the start. All I'm saying is it wasn't a great sign that at the very moment that the peace deal

was being negotiated in Minsk, a video immersed online of two Ukrainian MPs outside Parliament and Kiev beating the living shit out of each other. And the crazy thing is, they were both from centre-right parties that should nominally agree with each other. A Yegossobilev of the self-assistance political alliance and Vadim Ivchenko of the Farland Party kicked and passed each other in a spectacular bare fist brawl in the corridor of a government building. The video has to be seen to be believed, but if you cannot find it, then perhaps this journalist's magnificent description of it will suffice.

And I quote, At first, with one of the MPs on the floor receiving a kick to the face, a suited man attempts to drag the two men apart, yet he quickly received into the background as the men tried a series of blows to the face and upper body area for around 30 seconds. The only thing this video was missing Andy was a 15-year-old kid screaming,

world star in the background, or Don King somehow pocketing a huge amount of money behind them. Apparently, onlookers were either filming the fight on their cell phones or crying. And if there is a better summation of what is happening in Ukraine at the moment than that, I certainly have not heard it. Ukraine had made significant concessions to broker the peace deal, the problem being that Vladimir Putin is very much the man who puts the eye into compromise and the yet into yet-gilt negotiations. Making concessions to Putin's Russia is a tactic akin to pacifying a baby eating dragon by feeding it a baby on condition that it promises to go on one of

those trendy and no baby diets afterwards. The problems with this are A, you cannot fight nature, B, the dragon knows, now knows where you keep your babies, C, why is that dragon hanging around that maternity unit with a napkin tucked into its collar? D, my baby, my baby, E, what do you mean it could have done with some ketchup on mustard? F, okay, firey face, I'll get you some ketchup on mustard for the next one. Concession's very rarely working these situations, John. It's like working on a BBC comedy show. Heh heh. The White House spokesman, Eric Schultz, expressed that America would very much like Russia

and everyone else involved to abide by the ceasefire agreement, saying, what was agreed to last week was not a shopping list. You don't get to decide which items you're going to abide by. Those were commitments made by all parties and we expect them to keep their words. Now, for a start, it seems like Eric Schultz is a bit of a nasty when it comes to shopping lists, doesn't he? But also, the point, the broader point is,

he said that with the authority of a substitute teacher who already knows they've lost control of the classroom. And the even more chilling detail in this whole story is that some arguing that Russia may be partially using Eastern Ukraine to test its new military capabilities. Apparently, after the Georgia War in 2008, Russian generals were concerned at the performance of Russian troops.

And so I've been re-equipping and retraining them ever since, and have seen this conflict as a chance to test how far they've come. And if that is true, Andy, then this situation is even bleaker for Eastern Ukraine. Because if there is one thing worse than having Russia wanting to annex you, it's Russia wanting to annex you

so it can use you as a fucking firing range. Yeah, that's basically using Ukraine as a new material night. That's not so much what it's entirely acceptable. Putin we have to assume does not want an all-out war, not because he isn't a lunatic, but because he is a pragmatic lunatic rather than a lunatic lunatic. And he looks set to swing his political plonker as far as Anasalasi can without getting hurt. But he's now facing a really tough response from the West.

David Cameron John has warned Putin once again that there could be, and I quote, consequences as a result of what is happening. These consequences, he expanded, would be unacceptable for financial and economic consequences for his country for many years to come. Now Putin, the problem is, has shown that one man's unacceptable financial and economic consequence is another man's price very much worth paying. At Cameron added, one country is effectively challenging the territorial integrity of another, because those Russian back rebels in eastern Ukraine are using Russian rocket launchers, Russian tanks and Russian artillery. You cannot buy this equipment on eBay,

it comes from Russia. On those are the words, John, of a man who was tried to do some of these questions this week. This one came in from Richard who writes, on your upcoming tour of Australia Andy, will you be inviting our astemed Prime Minister, the honorable Tony Abbott, to one of your shows? The way he's performing, he's like to have quite a bit of spare time around your visit. Alternatively, you might like to catch up with him when he's in London, giving Prince Philip his knighthood. This is a truly extraordinary story. When I arrived in Australia about 10 days ago, Tony Abbott was just in the process

of surviving in no confidence vote, or as Australia it's called, a sum worries vote. To the outsider, it might seem like the only reason you would have confidence in Tony Abbott is if you are clinically insane, clinically hyper wealthy, Tony Abbott, a raging misogynist, a fervent racist, or simply love the concept of environmental armageddon. In Australia, not everyone is entirely 100% happy with their Prime Minister and certified Grankshaft. Abbott, as many listeners

and watchers of John's TV show will know, is a platinum-grade opinion splitter, and of like, he'd split that opinion into Australia and him and even his conditional supporters had to become a little concerned with his prime ministerial behaviour which has swung from the provocative and intolerant to the inexplicably bizarre and the high point of this for the new prospectator was Abbott's unilateral decision to give a knighthood to any guesses yes Prince Philip, they Prince Philip, the husband of her wrinkly majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, a man who was probably sitting at home thinking to himself, well, I'm husband of the Queen of the United Kingdom, therefore technically, husband of the Queen of

Australia, I'm his royal highness, the Duke of Edinburgh, I'm a certified prince, I'm the Earl of Maryoneth, Baron Greenwich, Royal Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Gata, Extra Knight of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle, Member of the Order of Merit, Grand Master and First and Principal Knight of Grand Cross, of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire. Lord of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, oh yeah, you know what I'm talking about. Personal aid to camper Her Majesty, Hel's Potato, she's still got it. Additional Member of the Order of New Zealand, extra companion of the Queen's Service Order, Royal Chief of the Order of Lagoho.

What is that? A service station, extraordinary companion of the Order of Canada, extraordinary command of the Order of Military Merit, Lord Hyad and rule of the United Kingdom. I've won a coronation, mydl and three Jubilee medals, I deserve them too, it's not just because I'm shagging the boss. In Zanzibar I remember the first class Order the Brilliant Star, lost in Singapore I'm an honouring member of the Daraia Uttama Temasek. I'm night-ground cross of the order of Christ in Portugal, I'm colonel in chief of more military regiments than you could dream off of breakfast, I have the freedom of the

city of Guadalajara, I'm an honouring member of the Canadian Medical Association, I've picked up a doctrine of laws from the University of Jordan without even going to Freshers week, but somehow I Feel incomplete. I know what I need Australia to give me a knighthood Well done Tony ever you are a fucking visionary At this one came in from Nathan in Atlanta who said dear Andy and John I hadn't heard of Boni M until I listened to the bugle I listened to a Bughal. I listened to a few songs and I like it.

Should I be embarrassed by that? I feel like I should, but I am not. Well, John, I mean... Andy, I don't know if your feelings are completely clear to Bughal is about Boni M, but you were a big fan. Huge fan. Huge, huge fan. I mean, they've done some of the classic songs, John, and you know, this is, this is the 21st century. I think we should all be free to listen to and like listening to whatever we want, whether that's, that's what Jesus Abraham Lincoln and Tony

Blair have all died for. So, Nathan, you shouldn't be ashamed of enjoying the funky groove of such chart hits as Daddy Cool, or the divinely endorsed neo-hymnic majesty of By the Rivers of Babylon, or the historically informative epic narratives of Marbaker, Eluta, or Rara, Rasputin, Vlad's grandad, of course, Rara. And then that's the best way to describe Boni Amtabee, but I haven't heard of them. And that is that if you can imagine a band that could put together a reggae infused version of the life of Rasputin, then what you're thinking of in your head is what actually existed. And amazingly, it was briefly intensely popular. I wouldn't, you know, I just can't, I think we live in an age

genre where you would hope people, people like me and Nathan would no longer be persecuted simply for the 1970s disco classics we listen to. I think we should be persecuted simply for the kind of people we are, and I guess if you like Boney M hits, well, we're just going to have to take whatever comes our way, we're clearly dicks. Dan Richards asks, how big is a small any any response to that John? No I've got no response to that. That's I'm not interested in questions that either meaningless or incredibly profound Andy. I like this sweet spot in the middle. I would say that a small is as big as the size of the smallest big provided it is bigger in proportion than the big that is smaller than the biggest small. So I hope that's clear that up. All in all it's about an eight. Dear Andy and John, I have a

cue I would like you to a says Lewis, what the f*** is going on in British politics? What's a nothing much Lewis just the gradual demolition of the foundations of democracy and social justice? The outsourcing of our national vital organs and the flogging off to the most convenient bit of everything we once held here. Other than that, all fine, looking forward to the election, it's going to be dignified to mature exchange of heartfelt political views, whose only true purpose is the embeddiment of the nation and its public discourse. Can't wait. Cannot wait. Here's a question you might be able to answer, John. It's from Kamen Leicester. He asks,

Hi, will you read my email out on the show? No, yeah, I can answer that. No, absolutely not. But that can't be any clearer than that. This one comes in from John Barnier, who asks, My wife is a seventh grade special education teacher. Sounds like a real gold digger. In a relatively affluent sub-over mini-appalist minnesota, what a glory hunter.

Last week she was told by a school administrator that her classroom was too messy and cluttered. She's a dream record. Granted, my wife at her own expense had filled her in with books, maps, and brain exercising games, and the intellectual showbode of the worst water she sounds like, to help enrich her students learning, do good in control freak interfering in other people's lives. But, according to the administrator who continues the email who is married to a Republican state representative, all this

had to go because, quote, it interfered with the student's ability to learn. One example was that my wife had too many dictionaries in the room, total number four. Am I imagining things or is something going wrong here? What would you say, John? Can you have too many dictionaries in a classroom? Of course you can, Andy. Depends whether you want to teach children to comply with how words are spelt or if you want to free them up to spell them how the f*** ever they want. Ha ha ha ha ha'll say once you've read one dictionary, you've read them all. I mean, why can't you really learn from dictionary number two? Besides, if she's a so-called teacher as she claims, she should be able to explain words

to her poor students herself without having to look at the f***ing things up. Do you really want our children's futures in the hands of a teacher who needs dictionaries? What is this? The 19th century. And besides Leonardo da Vinci, Shakespeare, Dante, Julius Caesar, Sunsu, never even had one dictionary between them, still turned out okay. So frankly, I think it's I'm entirely with the state of Minnesota on this one. So thanks for your Q&A's, Duke Emoz coming into info at thebugelpodcast.com. Don't forget you can still contribute to our appeal at gofundme.com slash this hyphen

is hyphen Michelle, there's a link also on the website thebugelpodcast.com and don't forget to check out our SoundCloud page SoundCloud.com slash the hyphen bugle. Now I'm out here in New Zealand and Australia for the Cricket World Cup. I like cups, I'm a big fan of the world and I love cricket so this is right in my personal cold scuttle. But John it has not gone well for England so far. I began last Saturday with England being narrowly obliterated by Australia by a massive margin. And today as we record on Friday in New Zealand England were due to player cricket match against New Zealand. Sadly that cricket game was cancelled and was replaced instead with some arcane local pop

pastime which appeared to be the rather brutal slaying of an already dead carcass of a once adequate puppy. England, I don't know if you saw what happened, but we were utterly and reprehensibly humiliated. We were clobbered, eviscerated, mashed, squished, splattered, and generally violated. In a dance as older sport itself, we were beaten, we were utterly thrashed at cricket by one of the teams that we taught to play at cricket. In fact, New Zealand won with so much time to spare that England had time to invent a new sport, teach New Zealand how to play it and loosen them at that as as well and still have time to attend the press conference afterwards

to find 35 different ways of saying massive pile of shit without actually using the words pile of shit. Now, I know not every bugle is infected with the benevolent virus of cricket but the last time an English thing was spanked this thoroughly was when the future king Edward VII ended up in an SNM brothel in Paris pretending to be a naughty donkey. It was, it was awful. If you only saw the result, John, and I guess you probably didn't watch the game bull by bull, it must have been like having your favourite kitten taken away in a van for questioning by the CIA, and it coming back three hours later

as a donica bag. The end result is bad, but what must have happened in between will keep your wake for months. It was that bad. It was almost literal desimation. That's all for this week's. Buegall thanks very much for listening. There are still some tickets left for one of my shows in Auckland on Tuesday, the 24th. I'm also hosting a benefit gig at the Battersea Arts Centre for Michelle's fund. On the 27th with Daniel Kitson, Russell Howard and Alan Cochran, the Bathsy Arts Centre if you check their website. I think there's still some tickets left for that as well and we will be back hopefully next week but certainly

some thanks once again for listening to Bueglers from the Southern Hemisphere where I am recording basically tomorrow John I'm a whole day ahead of you. Good bye. Bye! you