The Bugle - Humanity is Doomed

Episode Date: September 16, 2026

This week's issue of The Bugle, Andy is joined by Nish Kumar and Sara Barron, as the trio discuss the end of Humanity, the rise of Reform and Trump's current venture into World Peace. Plus Andy's spat with cricket legend David Warner and talk of a possible Zaltzamn X Rogan podcast collab? Keep your eyes peeled 👀 All this and more in issue 4390 of The Bugle. 💻 End of Humanity: The trio delve into the news that AI is sending our planet to Armageddon 🇮🇪 Trump's Irish Adventure: The Bugle reports on the latest from Trump's visit to Ireland 🎨 Failed Renoir Heist : Andy, Nish and Sara report on a failed Art theft in FranceAndy's Links: https://www.andyzaltzman.co.uk/Nish Kumar's Links: https://www.nishkumar.co.uk/Sara Barron's Links: https://www.instagram.com/sarabarron1000000/?hl=en🎧 Support The Bugle! Become a Team Bugle subscriber for bonus episodes, exclusive video editions, and the righteous satisfaction of funding satire:http://thebuglepodcast.com📺 Watch Realms Unknown on YouTubeProduced by Chris Skinner, Laura Turner and Harry Gordon. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

newspaper for a visual world. Hello, Bueglars, and welcome to issue 4,000. Am I a bit close to the mic here? Is that all right? Okay. You can keep that, but if you want. Hello, viewers. Good to show the what goes on around the magic perfection.

Welcome to issue 4,390 of the Bugal audio newspaper for a visual world. It's the 14th of September 2026. I'm Andy Zaltzman and I'm in London, the city where angels are, in fact, happy to tread as proved by the fact that two of them are right here with me now. Wow. That was nice. Wow. Nish Kumar, Sarah Barron.

Happy September. Welcome to the juggle. Welcome to the juggle. It's so nice to be here. What? What? Why are you, uh, introducing us with compliments? I don't know.

That's not the house style of this podcast. No, I know. Have you had a haircut as well? I had a haircut a few weeks ago. I haven't seen you in a while. Yeah. Sure. I haven't had my hair cup. I haven't had my paint polished yet.

Did you, do you, as is custom, make your overqualified wife do it? In a year beginning with Tunis, that means I did not play a professional to cut my hair. My wife has a doctorate, not in, not in coiffureen, but she does a solid job on it. Yes, her surname isn't Sassoon. Does she ever ask you, how does the haircut work in your house? Does she go, I'm going to have at that, or do you go, I need help? Sometimes, I mean, I need help generally just in life, so that's sort of understood really rather than spoken. That's beautiful.

Normally it's when I start finding myself sitting on the sofa literally tearing it out of my head that I think they probably need to get it cut. Am I sharing too much? I think you've got the glow because you've done nothing this summer apart from go on holiday and watch cricket. I think that's why you've got the kind of glow. That could be a big part. December of cricket? Well, I mean, the cricket itself was non-vintage, albeit it did have some of the craziest stuff.

Some of the best sub was. Including, I mean, the cricket itself was not great, but Pakistan did I mention this last week? They sent seven of their squad home and sacked their coaching staff and brought in a load of new players, one of whom, at the age of 21, in his first game last week in this weekend just gone in Birmingham, hit 9. sixes,

tying the all-time record for most sixes in the test innings in England. Would you believe? You don't need to be a rocket scientist to know that. You do, however, need to be a cricket statistic.

Yeah, yeah. So is that good? Yeah, that was good. This guy is the dream. Yeah, it was amazing. The great hope. Yeah, so that was, that rescued the summer of it.

You got in a, I saw a, I saw a little clip of you, you got in a feud with Australian cricket legend David Warner, but sort of by accident. Yeah, I mean,

when you say I got in a feud with it. I've had no contact with David Warner. I don't know if he's attempted to contact me because I'm dormant on social media. I don't know these things. So what happened was, and it was nothing to do with me, this beef. What happened was, I... That's what Kendrick Lamar said, Andy. But it's not who starts the beep, is who ends it. Okay, look, what happened was

I quoted, David Warner came up in a stat. Yeah. It was not particularly flattering to him. So a pair in cricket, those unfamiliar with it, which if you've been listening to the bugle this long, you should really know what it is now. I'm going to speak for Sarah Barron here and say she's going to need a clarification. But a player gets nought in both innings

and the Pakistan opener, one of the players flown in as an emergency with absolutely no practice. Unsurprisingly, it didn't do very well. So two noughts, so I looked up, the last opening about us to get two Norts against England, the last two were both David Warner.

So I mention this on air. Now the BBC, because it's the 2020s, they then put little snippets on their. text commentary and they put a picture of me with this stack on their text commentary. Then David Warner puts up an unrelated social media message criticizing another Australian cricketer for not doing very well, at which point the English Barmy Army, England's cricket supporters who are, I'm not sure they're technically, I don't know what, the medical state of Bar Minus is, and they're not armed, but anyway, that's the name they go.

No, but I still think it's good to talk about mental health problems and the Barmy Army has been trying to Platform discussions about mental health since the early 80s. They then replied to David Warner's tweet to an Australian about another Australian cricketer with my stat about him getting two pairs against England. Then one of my commentary colleagues says, Andy, you seem to be in a beef with David Warner.

And I said, what are you talking about? So anyway, so I'm, I don't think I am, there's as much beef there as there is in, you know, some branded pasties. I think that... Well, there's as much beef as there is in my system. Right, yeah. And I don't eat beef.

Did you get an anxiety spake or are you like, oh, yeah, I'm in the midst of a... No, I don't figure my path will cross with David Warner that much. We might end up hosting a, I don't know, some like astrophysics podcast together at some point, but it seems unlikely. Does Warner do much on the comms? Because there is an Ashes series next summer. So there is a possibility you could be in a commentary box with him. I guess that's... And then there's only one solution.

Fight to the death. But then, I mean, David Warner, not very popular with English cricket fans. Famously. But I actually quite liked him as a cricketer. So, you know, I'm one of the very few English cricket fans who actually quite like David Warner's for life. Anyway, it was one of the highlights of my summer. It was very much a 2020s story.

It involved an online beef. And it also involved a fuck of a lot of bullshit about stuff it wasn't actually happening. Yeah. But also, grusually, it did involve test cricket. I think that brings it back to the mid-90s somehow. Mish, how was your Edinburgh? My Edinburgh was great. I mean, I guess the high point was one of the last shows of the run.

A 13-year-old was in the audience, and I said, did your parents bring you? And he said, no, I brought them. And I said, you've got a geeky vibe. And he said, yes. And I said, you spend a lot of time in the library. And he says, I've got a book with me right now. And he took out of his pocket.

copy of Machiavelli's The Prince. Oh, really? And what I would say that I've learned mainly from that is a comedian will get the audience they deserve. And they will make an audience in their own image. And I have made an audience of fucking nerds.

Well, congratulations on monetising the nerd. Takes one to no one, Andrew. Host of the bugle and cricket statistician. You're not exactly what I call jock material. Not yet. Not yet.

I'm working out. Oh, you've got a protein match. Is that the next place of the bugle? We're going to get in on that diary of the CEO, Joe Rogan, horseship. You're going to start protein maxing and telling people to take horse tranquilizer instead of medicine. I think me and rogues could team that one for me. I don't want you to get dirty around him. Oh, my God.

If you went on the Joe Rogan experience, I think I would laugh myself today. I think it would be a case of tone. I can't imagine two people, even though you technically are, you are both comedians, so you have the same job, but I cannot imagine two people more philosophically separated.

This sounds like a show that has to be made, so... I would watch it. You're a couple of bald lads with spicy takes. Exactly. We have a title. Spicy takes with the ball boys. So obviously,

Obviously one of the listeners of this podcast is going to make that artwork. Obviously. We are recording on the 14th of September, as I said, 2026. On the 15th of September 1835, Charles Darwin reached the Galapagos Islands on HMS Beagle, on his turtle bothering and Bible quibbling lads only booze, birds and biology field trip. Actual birds, he was very well. Chuck D, the first, he was aged just 22 at the start of the voyage. Classic post-uny round the world jaunt to find.

himself instead it took nearly five years and he found the theory of evolution and went on to become one of the biggest celebrity scientists of the 19th century. The islands, the Glappix Islands, previously known simply as the Pagos Islands before their big money naming rights sponsorship deal with gala bingo halls, helped Chuckie work out that the weirdness and variety of the natural world and all the frankly ridiculous and poorly designed creatures in it was due to evolutionary chance and natural selection rather than because everything was rushed out and hurry by an overworked created deity he was having to design, make and sign off species at breakneck speed without having the chance to run safety checks, viability tests or even look at them to see if they were patently

rubbish and shat all over the place. That was just 191 short years ago. And if you could see the speed evolution we're inflicting on ourselves right now, I hope we'd keep his 19th century mouth shut about the context of evolving anything, the as yet unbearded idiot. I don't know whether it's because I've just had a coffee or I had a particularly delicious omelet from a local cafe or I haven't seen you in a while. But that to me, felt like your Sistine Chapel. It felt like pure distilled Zaltzman, because it was factually accurate,

and yet somehow it was also total bullshit. It featured the phrase Chuck D. the first. That might be the quintessential piece of Andy Zaltzman comedy. Well, there we go. We're back, baby. We're back. We're back. There is a section in the bin,

but since we've had quite a long start, I'm going to save the section in the bin for later, unusually. Wait, you put the section in the bin in the bin for now. I'm going to get it out of the bin. Ben on Ben. Towards the end of the show and re-bin it then. Because it's time now for top story.

Humanity is doomed. 2030 is the year that it could all end. In fact, by 2030, according to researchers from Anthropic who say that AI could cause our entire species to go extinct by 2030. Now, the implications of that are clearly huge. It means we've already potentially had the last men's football World Cup. Whether that's a good or bad thing. I don't know.

2030 was set to have a big carbon bootprint. I was going to go studs up on the environment. Matches on three different continents. So, you know, it might be a good thing, but that the world ends, or humanity ends before the World Cup. One more Summer Olympics. and that's going to be slathered with Trump in L.A.N. 28. So we basically already have the last Olympics

that doesn't make you vomit all over your television set. The bugle will sadly fall short of the 1,000 episode, Mark. In spite of this being episode 4,000 and whatever it is. There is that. We're heading towards 700 full episodes, and at 40-ish per year, we need AI not to destroy the world until ideally 2035. Although ironically, of course,

the AI could easily pump out several million episodes the Bueble per second. It might be good for the show. As long as there are enough AI bots to join the voluntary subscription scheme to keep it going. But if you want to join the voluntary subscription scheme before the AIBots,

do go to the Buebelpodcast.com and click the donate button. There's no way AI could do your comedy. No one would generate this. I'll take that as a compliment. There's one in there. You've got to look for it. There's one in there. So are you guys worried about this?

You know, that's, you know, 20. That's quite soon, really, isn't it? I'm going to focus on the positives with this. I think, like, end of the world, three and a half to four years works for me. I'll tell you why. My son at that stage will be entering puberty. And what I do not need to do is be, like, rinsing out, like, jizzy socks. That's just not a part of parenthood that I'm looking forward to.

Furthermore, my mother will be hitting 83 around that time, which is just around when it's going to be workable for me to put her in a home, and I don't want to spend that money. Well, there's two upsides. Um, uh, Nish, what I mean? Well, look, the background to this is an AI researcher who quit the firm Anthropic has said that people working on the technology are genuinely frightened. And he said, I believe that if we don't slow down at the current rate of progress, there is a strong chance that we could all die in the immediate future. This guy called Jacob Coxon, who was speaking to the BBC after he, is this resignation post went viral. His former boss, Dario Amaday, who's the boss of Anthropic, was also called for AI development to slow down. Now, look, it is the thing with AI, from what I can tell, and I don't understand this,

and I don't think I'm the first person to say that. A lot of this stuff, basically, this warnings about doom mongering around it, is to do with jacking up stock prices. And actually, an AI is basically predictive text with a fancier hat. From what I can tell, that is essentially what AI is, right? It's basically predictive text with some funky gloves. That's essentially what it is. But the problem with AI is that it is actually going to destroy the world,

but not because it's going to build. Basically, the end of the world that's brought about by AI is not going to be like the Terminator. It's not going to be time-traveling robots and Linda Hamilton with unbelievable guns. Oh, my God. Wowie, Sarah Connor. Never forget, James Cameron said there were three terminators in that second movie. Sorry, I've become distracted.

AI is going to end the world, but it's going to end the world by hastening climate change because of the incredible amount of carbon pollution that's pumped out by data centres, it's going to end the world by spreading all sorts of fake information all across the internet. That it's going to end the world to a much more boring way. And most importantly, it's going to cause untold damage because this is a stock market bubble that is going to burst.

And again, this is not my opinions. These are opinions of people that know things about things that I have interviewed in the last two months who are all saying that AI is creating a stock market bubble that's going to explode. Later this week, I will do a TV show hosted by my great friend and brother from another mother, Edward Gamble. The show is called Unacceptable. And the premise of the show is that you take something, probably that you believe in, but express it in the most unacceptable way.

Or you just say something that's flat out unacceptable and the intellectual exercise is how to defend it. Before you do these shows, they have a researcher call you up and ask you what you're going to say on the show. And someone called me and said, okay, you're doing the show, what's your most unacceptable opinion? And I said we should seriously consider as a legitimate tactic of protest bombing data centers. Not in a way that brings any harm to any individual that works in the buildings, but I believe that structural damage is a legitimate tactic of protest because I honestly believe this industry is at war with our way of life. And also, crucially, it's not going to be because of cool robots.

It's going to be because of hasten climate change and an exploding stock market bubble. As I say, I would never want to bring harm to anybody, but I do think we need to consider bombing AI data centers. That was a legitimate tactic property damage used by, the ANC and Mandela in South Africa, and we need to start thinking about that. And she said, that is way too unacceptable. That is way too unacceptable.

I said, I thought that was the name of the show. Not superficially contentious, but ultimately palatable. Can I say one more upshot? Yep. If the world ends, we don't have to sit through another season of Ted Lassau. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Everyone will know that Nish's very close friends,

not only with Edward Gamble, but also with Mr. Breckle's teeth of men. Health magazine, but I think it is okay to punch up in that way, Nish. You also don't have to watch that now. There's 10,000 terrible television shows that you can also watch. No, I know, but it's always being served to me, and that's what I resent. Basically, these people, the Sam Altman's, the Elon Musk's of this planet, the Dario Amoda, these are all people that have a vested interest. There's not plural of all of them now.

I believe there's at least three Sam Altman's. Is Dario as bad as the other ones? Apparently Anthropic... She has the face of a nice guy. But apparently Anthropic is less bad. But I think it's a real sliding scale here. We're on a sort of Stalin versus Pol Pot situation. If you actually...

If you go absolute numbers, then yes, I guess Pol is worse than Joey. But they're all bad. All of this stuff is designed to inflate share prices. And even things like warning about the end of the world is designed to make people think that these products can do stuff that they can't actually do. It's basically like saying the Microsoft base. Paperclip is going to bomb us all into oblivion. It was making me think, you know when they were like, they don't do it anymore, but with older horror films, they would say these things.

They'd be like, this thing is so scary. People are having heart attacks and they're dying. Like, this thing is so scary, it's going to kill you. And I've been feeling that again. Yeah. With this. That is what it is. It's basically a promotional campaign for a B movie.

So, I mean, this is the thing with all these threats of Armageddon. You know, I'm generally against Armageddon as a concept. I'm fascinated by the use of the word generally. Generally. If it's going to happen, though, I don't want it to be mundane and prosaic. I want it to be, you want it to be spectacular. You want spectacle? Yeah.

Give me acceptable versus on, give me prosaic, give me spectacle. Well, I mean, look, spectacle, you've got, you know, your classic asteroid from outer space. You've got your alien invasion. Uh-huh. You know, that kind of stuff. I think, you know, none of us would mind that necessarily. But just, you know, being, just gradually fizzling out in the fevered, you know, ego-driven dreams of tech billionaires. That's not, I don't see that as a valid end.

I've always been clearer that I would rather the world ended than I died. Right. I've always been very clear about that. I don't want to miss out on you, movies, albums or parties. So I've always been quite clear that I'd rather. But I do think, unfortunately, the part of this conversation that we're having about, oh my God, AI is going to end the world

is to distract us from the fact that, yeah, it is. It is doing it in a much more boring way. And also, crucially, in a much more preventable way, because in order to fight Terminators, you have to build time machines, you have to send John Connor back to warn himself about the future, all this kind of stuff. But what you can do is not have data centers.

that pollute the atmosphere and also suck up clean water from all of the nearby areas. And I have to say, like, looking at the three of us, no one in this room has survivors' energy. Like, all three of us would be very first to die. No, no, I'm absolute. You're out.

I'm day two meat. Right. Like, day two, everyone's eating meat to survive. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'd have to volunteer. If I was in a live-style plane crash situation, I'd, as the plane is going down, start basting myself in a marinade.

First to go. I've seen enough disaster films. I don't look good enough in a t-shirt to survive. You know what I don't know what I heard recently. I was thinking this during all of the heat waves that we've all endured because of the data centers is that you never see, like I was thinking about like men who take their t-shirts off, which I don't know, but I'm going to assume neither one of you has ever taken your t-shirt off. No, I've actually got a layer of 100 t-shirts built up because I never take them off.

The only tattoo I've got is of a full t-shirt off. shirt on my t-shirt. That you never see, you never see a real big boy with his t-shirt off. You know? It's like there's some, like you see like really fit people with their t-shirts off. And then sometimes some medium people. Super big boy, t-shirt on. You've got to go to the right places, I think.

You're seeing super big boys with t-shirts off? Yeah. I think, I believe based on some archival footage I've seen, the after party of any test cricket series in the 1980s. You saw some big boys. boys with their shirts off there. Big boys gets their shirt off at cricket. I stand corrected. Oh yeah.

And I will say cricket, football, night out in Newcastle. Big boys with their shirts off. Big boys. I've not been around enough cool parties. All three of those places. I've seen some shirtless big boys. So this guy, Jacob Coxon, said he resigned because Anthropic, where he was working in opening where he previously worked, were quotes not acting responsibly.

he said they're racing straight to self-improving super intelligence and gambling with our lives. Now, as a British person, I take this particularly hard because we have a, you know, and if either or both Anthropic and Open AI are listening, and we can be pretty sure they are. Always. Even if they don't know it. We have an old saying in this country, please gamble responsibly. It's back to the earliest cave art ever found.

Is it an old saying or a half a half? fast conscience laundering tagline and gambling that's so hard to tell the difference these days. Obviously, gambling responsibly is not philosophically possible. You cannot, you can, I guess, gamble non- irresponsibly. You cannot gamble responsibly.

The closest thing you have to gambling responsibly is insurance. But when what you're gambling with, isn't your own money or someone else's money or your children's futures or whether or not you will crash your car or have your laptop stolen, But whether we last as a species until the 2031 ashes,

that's, you know, that, those words do not reassure me. You guys know who I'm feeling really sorry for? It's the Amish. Right, okay. They should really be enjoying some Shodenfraid right now, except they probably have no idea what's going on. And if they do, then they're a bunch of fucking hypocrites. If any Amish person is listening to this, where is your principal?

The good news, however, and we need to hold our virtual horses here and hold them close to our hearts, because although AI is going to destroy us by 2030, you've got to believe headlines. By the time the next UK general election is due, in fact, so there are some plus points, I guess. We don't have to find out exactly how much of a horrendous shit have we become as a nation. AI is also going to cure all known diseases. Oh, yeah. So that we're all in tip-top physical shape for the end of human existence, which is good. That's good news, isn't it?

Google DeepMind, the AI Megabot that is chunking through the combined knowledge of the universe, which Google shallow mind and its buddies distract us. Memes of caterpillars trying socks on and dogs dressed as Joan of Arc. Google DeepMind is mapping human DNA, that old chestnut. Actually, we did share some DNA with chestnuts, albeit not enough to really think of them as not worth eating when they're nicely roasted over a fire. Anyway, the results could enable Bofin scientists to pinpoint genetic mutations that cause disease. Turns out it might not be the almighty gods of Olympus who cause them all after all. And, you know, basically cure all known diseases.

So I guess that's, you know, something we can enjoy in the next three and a half of the four years before it's all over. The problem is that the custodians of this industry have proven themselves to largely be untrustworthy. And so when I read headlines like AI can cure all disease, I immediately think what's the worst possible interpretation of this. And that means if it can cure all disease, it can also generate all disease. And we'll become a non-stop factory for bio-weapons. And I will say, the only reason I have no faith in these people that run these industries is because of everything they have done and said.

Well, look, I've said it before on this. That's on this show. That's such an old-fashioned way of looking at the group. That's wokeism. Judging people by the things they say and do who's not going to get us out of this mess, niche. You need to be more forgiving of people. I know you both are sort of famous for taking a dim view of fascists in the past,

but would you be willing to give eugenics or rethink if they discover the gene that makes someone a c-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-that-we're-the-one-genetic code they'll never find? Look, I mean, the way I see it is essentially what we've learned from this show so far is that God has been, fully replaced. And look, I'm an atheist, and I have the impending eternity in the fary boughs of hell to prove it. And, you know, basically, I believe that religion should be banned in public and compulsory in private. I think the world of... Yeah, that's it, right? That actually is weirdly...

Oh, my God. That's brilliant. That joke puts you exactly philosophically aligned with my father, Andrew. Not for the first time. I'll say this. Not the first time. Your love of test cricket, red meat. and specific belief that religion should only happen behind closed doors

and three areas of total overlap between you and my father's worldview. My father is a man who has prayed obsessively every single day. My entire life, he also does not believe in public displays of religion. He's against the building of any religious building, including temples, Hindu temples, faith of which he is a practitioner. He does not believe any building should ever be allowed to have a religious belief in it. And he believes religion, like the Victorians thought about sex, was something that happens behind closed-door

and should not be discussed or displayed in public. Well, there we go, well, if your dad wants to adopt me since, my own father passed away. He could sub you out, and he could have the son he always wanted. I don't know, man. He's already dealing with one curly-haired disappointment. Donald Trump interferes in the UK news now, and if you're not heard of him,

Donald Trump is a current American president and multiple Western Hemisphere complete of the year winner. And this week he said, oh, why, I fucking bother. Why bother saying what he said? I don't think we should, I don't think we should listen to what he said. It's quite hard to avoid hearing what he says. But I don't think we should actively listen to his sound and fury. If anyone else, so this, he talks about Ireland and, you know, saying he'd be, you know,

just stuck his awry on the, the thorny issue. of Irish unification, which is a complex topic that generally requires quite a bit of background reading. And without wishing to make too many presumptions, I'm guessing he didn't do much of that background reading. Anyway, if anyone else who had nothing to do with Ireland and clearly knows nothing about it, had said they'd love to see United Ireland, would people pay attention to that? I don't know they would.

So I don't think they'd put it this way. If Mary Berry, the celebrity non-agenarian TVK ecologist. started banging on about how public enemy could have improved their 1988 album. It takes a nation of millions to hold us back. Would you listen to her? Now, Nish, I know you're a hip-hop fan. Would you, I mean... I would absolutely love to know Mary Berry's opinion on Flavar.

Right. Ironically, if Terminator X outlined a recipe for passion fruit and walnut frangipan, you'd be all in. Such is like, if a dolphin started squawking on about how best to climb Mount Everest, you would swim straight out of the aquarium, so you didn't have to listen to that shit. I always forget that you are secretly a public enemy fan, but I will say this week has really reminded me of that,

given the prevalence of Chuck D, and now this whole suite of material, and the fact that you referred to him as Terminator X and not Terminator 10. The 10th. It's a pretty extraordinary detail. Yeah, listen, I think you, unfortunately, I understand the point that you've made,

and I agree with it, but you've stumbled on accidentally, said, something that I really would want to hear. I would really quite like to hear Mary Barry's opinion on it takes a nation's willing to hold us back. I'd absolutely love to hear her thoughts on fear of a black planet. But yeah, but broadly I agree with the point that you're

trying to make Andy. Now look, let's talk about all the islands up. But it's really important that we establish why Donald Trump is in Ireland in the first place. Is he there on an official state visit? Of course he's not there on an official state visit. This is one of the laziest to have ever existed. And the reason he's there

is because he has a resort. in County Clare, which is hosting the Irish Open. He's not there on official state business at all, but he had to sit down with... It's a golf trip, basically. It's a golf trip. He's one of the laziest motherfuckers to ever live. Also, bear in mind, there is a continued cost of living crisis happening in America. The war in Iran, which Trump started, continues to rage on.

There are all manner of foreign domestic things that he should be worried about. And yet, he's managed to find time to pop for a weekend on a golf holiday. And the thing that makes me laugh most about that is he's... did not attend his son's wedding. He did not, famously, did not attend Donald Jr.'s wedding because, and I quote, we've got this thing called Iran. He did not attend his own son's wedding, and yet he has managed to find the time to go on a golf jaunt to Ireland.

It is really incredible how little of a shit he gives about his job and his fucking kids. And also, just on the, you know, the fact that he's talking about Ireland, this is a man who's built an entire political career on dividing his own nation and trying to divide other people's nations and now he's claiming to want to unify someone else's. So I'm going to let that one go buy outside off stump. Yeah, I'm not sure he's an expert on Irish issues. And I believe if somebody asked him what he thought of the Good Friday Agreement, he'd assume it referred to what Pontius Pilate did or in the words of Donald Trump when that Palestinian Jew got what he deserved. Maybe one compromise thinking about it though. And look,

obviously not my business any more than it's Trump. It's clearly massively complex. One compromise would be for the whole of the UK to join Ireland. And that seems the best way to give everyone what they want. I mean, that would be absolutely hilarious if that's how things ends up. Bobby Sand's revenge. The rest of the UK applies to join Ireland to get us, A, back in the EU, and B, just be nice for everybody.

There's another thing. Trump, obviously, it took some time out from his busy schedule of not going to his own kids' wedding and introducing the memory of the victims of 9-11, which he seems to really found quite a lot of time for. Also, he shared a video on his so-called social media site, which doctored footage of other world leaders appearing to act like heartless shitbags, including our very own King Charles, apparently ignoring a supermarket worker who fainted when he was, you know, at an event at a supermarket,

which isn't what happened. The whole video was set to a song called A Thousand Years by Christina Perry. And if you had any doubt as to Trump's true nature, just think who else wanted to rule for a thousand years. Yeah, I'd not think about that too much. And previously he's gone out of his way to kind of, you know, fawn to the king because he's obsessed with celebrity and royalty. He's previously described King Charles as the greatest king in my book. Admittedly, his book is a copy of Mr. Tickle.

A picture of, it takes his face care regime from him as well, with a picture of Charles drawn in marker pen by one of his age. So he'd recognize him during a state visit. I mean, it's not the most presidential way. I don't know. I mean, I think maybe there just needs to be global moratorium. There's just no one reports anything that he does on it. It's hard to, isn't it? Because we all know that he's doing this for attention.

But at the same time, he is still the President of America. So in the video, there's various footage, including of King Charles. There's footage of President Joe Biden checking his watch, apparently during a military repatriation ceremony and President Obama stepping off the Marine one helicopter and saluting US Marines while holding a paper cup in his hand. They then follows a series of clips where Trump picks up the cap of a US Marine, salutes at a repatriation ceremony, and comforts the families of fallen soldiers. and the caption reads, the side of the media, the side of Trump, the media doesn't show you.

And that is sort of telling it its own way, because the side of Trump that the media doesn't show us is total lies and bullshit. And it is sort of incredible that he is such a, that he has to get AI to create footage of him doing something basically decent. It's sort of amazing that he's, we sort of come to this point with him now where he has to kind of, surely there must be some footage of him doing something like even just as a put something kind just even vaguely Yeah but there isn't because he doesn't And he skipped his own son's wedding

To sit in his house and watch golf and masturbate Allegedly Allegedly I think he's too old now Do you think so? Yeah he doesn't have a virile energy That's the whole fucking I mean that's not the whole point But that's I believe to be No I mean listen he does look like he's been

Weekend of Bernice around the place for the last few months. It just seemed like that. That does not work anymore. But it is funny that he has to doctor images of himself doing kind things to detract from the fact that in reality, he's a child ignoring star of the Epstein files. The only children he's left alone are his own. Well, we can't take this lying down in this country, this misrepresentation of our god-given monarch.

So after Trump shared this misleading video of a child's ignoring a fainting man, we at the bugle are hitting back with our eyes. own false footage involving Trump and King Charles. Time for a change of bowling. King Charles III is coming back on from the pavilion end. Taking strike is Donald Trump. In

comes the king now. He's up to the wicket. He bowls to Trump. He's bowled it! Bowled him! All three stumps out of the ground. Yet another golden duck for the presidents. That's 17 in a row of Trump now down. He's claiming it. Didn't it the stunts?

Of course. He's got to go. And America 12 to 7 Was it real? Was it fake? Who can tell these days? It's pure as ultimate. It's unbelievable.

That is absolutely incredible. British democracy being sold to crypto billionaires news now and yeah, basically the whole of our democracy is now for sale. Reform UK have taken $2.36 million donation.

which they claim was entirely in line with the law. Whether or not that's true or not, I guess depends on whether you believe things that reform UK say, and even if it is true, then the law has got to take a long, hard bath with itself and think about what it's doing. That's quite a lot of... There was also another recent newspaper sting

in which potentially illegal donations were discussed. Nigel Farage has got this meeting, and he claimed he wasn't listening. Which is sort of on brand because he hasn't been listening, for example, during the last 30 years. Certainly wasn't listening during history classes at school or economic classes at school.

And he certainly wasn't listening to anything anyone else said at his party's conference in Birmingham a couple of weekends ago. So, I mean, party funding is a bit of a tricky issue. It's obviously tricky in America. And we can only really dream of the sums of money that go to buy power and influence in America. But we're getting there, I think.

I mean, this is a sign of progress that, you know, we're, you know, our sort of tendency towards legalized corruption that we have in this country where we get our corruption, rather than under the table, we get above board. We put people in the House of Lords and we just make sure that everyone, you know, everyone can see the corruption happening. But this is taking it to a new level, I think. Well, can I just, I want to say in defense,

because people accuse these crypto guys of being in it for themselves. But they're actually, they do. a lot to help other people who are excluded from society. Example, organized crime syndicates who have had a hard time moving their money around in the regular banking system. Obviously, I'm for a cap on donations, but I just think there's like bigger ones that we have to worry about, including but now limited to sponsoring people running half marathons and the end of the year whip around for gifts for your kids, teachers. I'm not that generous. I know, can I say as well, one of my favorite parts of the story was how the second crypto guy put in $32 million because the other one did.

I feel like at the end of it's a wonderful life, but for that film. It's a wonderful. It's a wonderful. Also, Reform said, okay, so they said $72 million would be used to hire, quote, the brightest and best minds to work on policy. sure, but they should probably also set aside some money for their candidates to get their swastika tattoos removed. Yeah, it's two, $2.36 million donations, which again, for American listeners, I imagine you've laughed yourself to death at this point, because I imagine $72 million probably buys you a sort of junior senator in the American political process. But yeah, these are the largest ever donations in British political history. history, and it amounts to almost double the campaign funding jointly received by Labor or

the Conservative Party this year. So it really does put reform front and centre. And yes, so Ben Dello, who is a cryptocurrency billionaire, has given £36 million to Reform UK. Also, that's then prompted Christopher Harbourn, who is the Thailand-based cryptocurrency billionaire, who'd already given Nigel Farage £5 million. That donation is actually the subject of a parliamentary investigation. about whether Farage should have declared it. And so he's now given £36 million because he says he's done it in competitive spirit. And I think for the first time in history, this is the only time I wish there'd been a penis measure in context. Absolutely.

I never thought. But what I would have given for those two to just get them out and get to comparing, that would have been much better, a much better use of everybody's time. But yeah, it's pretty interesting for the Reform Party which sort of styles it. as the voice of working Britain. We've got two separate 36 million pound donations from two people. And, you know,

not to sort of indict the kind of people that are supporting reform, but Ben Tello was convicted in the US for failing to implement adequate anti-money laundering controls at one of his firms. He was sent as the 30-month probation given $10 million.

So how was he sort of out and about? You are given $10 million or given a $10 million fine? I think one and then the other. Okay, right. I think he was given a $10 million fine and then given $10 million to pay it off. And he was actually pardoned by Donald Trump. So you've sort of got, you know, you've got an absolute circle jerk of twattery that's happening here.

And so reform is now going to use this money on, you know, hard to say what they're going to use it on. I guess. Swastika tattoo river ball. Well, I guess the counter. That might not appeal to some sections of their base. Andy Burnham has, you know, coming and made quite a big thing of cleaning up party funding. what he's going to do, we don't yet. No, I guess the counter argument would be this, that we live in a free market consumer

economy. We would have thought the Cold War had it ever got hot to keep our right to let the free markets decide everything about how we live. And if you're legally allowed in this country to buy a loaf of bread or a pencil or a vintage combine harvester or the solar football or a house or a knighthood, does it not also stand to reason that you should be able to buy a behind-the-scenes unaccountable controlling stake in British politics. Yeah, and also, you know, what's better than a single standard, a double standard.

Because obviously, obviously, if this was happening in Asia country or an African country, we'd have frothing at the mouth in the British press. Corruption, corruption. Remember, it's only corruption when they're black or brown. But when white people do it, it's called lobbying. It's just a little semantic difference. God. Farage also said that he would ban face coverings in public.

This was after there were various far rights, I don't know, protest isn't the right word, but Dorset police had to protect volunteers for the lifeboat service, the R&LI after they were attacked by self-proclaimed patriots dressed in black clothes and balaclavas. Now, look, patriotism comes in many forms. Some people wave a flag. Some sing a national theme song.

Some go, for example, to a library in Italy and spray paint graffiti saying Shakespeare was better than Dante all over the walls. Some British people just well up at the mere thought of a sausage. And some dress up as fascists and abused life vote volunteers. It turns out. And we would have thought that amongst, you know, the key kind of cornerstones of British patriotism would be remembering who actually won the fucking war. that the Patriots are so obsessed by But you have to remember, Andy Yeah

And I apologise if I've said this on this podcast before There are a substantial and vocal I was saying it's still a minority But there are a vocal minority of people Who's only problem with the Nazis Was that they were German That's sort of the key issue they had They were actually pretty on board

With a lot of the other stuff Be it beliefs, vibes Or in the case of these lads, clothing I mean, being charitable, and I always try to find the best in people, as I've done in almost 700 episodes on the bugle. The black clothes were maybe harking back to old-fashioned football referees, arbiters of unimpeachable British fairness and fair play, and the balaclavas were tributes to our great polar explorer, such as Captain Scott Silver Medalist in the 1911-12 Antarctica Grand Prix.

So let's hope that was the case. I'm going to go ahead and blame God for setting a bad precedent with the whole drowning everyone you don't like thing. I also feel we're getting very close to the end of the whole then they came for the list if we're up to volunteers who save people from drowning. Yeah. Like what else is left now? Yeah. So there's been, I guess we have to call them protest. We can't really call them protests because it's not really clear what they want.

Because a lot of the footage just involves them standing completely silently. Now, I've been on quite a few protests in my time. They tend to not be silent affairs. They tend to not be on library rules vis-a-vis making sound. And you tend to be quite clear what the protesters are aiming towards, right? And so with these guys sort of standing silently, it remains slightly opaque. But they descended on the port of Dover and Portsmouth. and they're from a group called Patriot Platform.

Now, Patriot Platform is led by a man called Daniel Thomas, who's known online as Daniel Tomo. And if you're thinking, I think that man might have been privately educated at great expense. You're absolutely correct. Of course he was. Of course he was. And he said that he's actually, Daniel Thomas is actually, you know, again,

you might be thinking, has he spent time in jail? Of course he spent time in jail for his part in a kidnapping attempt. You might also think, is that man good British, Kidnapping. Good British kidnapping. Good, solid, salt of the earth, British kidnapping. What could be more central to our values than participating in a kidnapping attempt? He's also banned from France. He's literally bad from France. Because in January, he was part of a group of extremists that were trying to smash up boats in France. And the French authority said, our rule of law is non-negotiable. Violent and hate inciting tactics have no place in our territory. Classic fucking French.

What a bunch of Pussies. That is exactly the difference between us and the French. Our rule of law is eminently negotiable and we have nothing but time for violent and hate inciting tactics. This is exactly the sort of thing

that meant that we had to leave the European Union, getting away from those cheese-eating surrender monkeys. There's two points of interest that are worth discussing here. One, that they went to Dover because they said they wanted to, they basically wanted to sort of stop the boats that were coming in.

and they did stop quite a few boats. They impeded quite a lot of ferries that were bringing tourists into Dover. So that's really dealing with the root cause of the problem here. Tourists from Holland coming here to take photos and selfies outside Eminem World. And they also, in Portsmouth,

the branch of Patriot Platform, they dealt with a real problem, Andy. They went to a hotel where online rumours had circulated that a large group of suspicious-looking non-white men had gathered, and they were right in that it was the Pakistan under 19 cricket team. They went to a hotel to apprehend a group of Pakistani children who were over here playing cricket. Now, I'd like to briefly return to something that Daniel Thomas said about... Daniel Tammer.

Yeah, sorry, D. Tom's. I'd like to return to something that D. Tom said. He said that when it came to who they were looking for, he had handpicked his group of activists and they had gone for quality over quantity. Swing and a miss, D-Times! Swing and a miss! You have assembled some of the dumbest in history who stopped tourists coming here to spend money

and a group of children playing cricket. Maybe I'm not giving Patriot Platform enough credit. Maybe Patriot Platform are actually covertly working for the Pakistani cricket board who are trying to get more of their underperforming cricketers home. Art fevery news now. And, I mean, there's a lot of darkness around the world, but sometimes, you know, a story.

It brings hope. And this is a story about some incompetent art thieves who attempted to steal. They did okay. They did okay. Like, I don't think that was fair. They were like not perfect, but they weren't fully incompetent. Yeah, so they stole four Renoir paintings from a museum and managed to drop two in the garden. Now, look, there's a number of elements of this.

One, I think Renoir's massively overrated. Wow. You really do without them, to be honest. Wow. As I mentioned on the radio last week, you can hear the news quiz on BBC sounds. Oh my God, another beef for Zolzman. Yeah, taking on water and Rang-Raw. It's easy to still Rémmoir painting because it looks like you're just walking out with a big box.

Shut the fuck up, Andy! Take that, Ranguer! Oh, my God. Zolzman is so pretty. Why are you being like this? Ransding Rino. This is astonishing. Oh, my God.

Comedy is. Central Sultzman versus Renoir. Anyway, so it was kind of Schrodinger's burglary. They got away with it, but they also didn't get away with half of it because they dropped them in the garden. So,

yeah, I mean this is a fantastic story. You think it's a kind of lack of attention to details, maybe symptomatic of the age we're living that remembering not to drop two massive great impressions paintings in the garden would be on the list. I liked the detail that they were

So they'd apparently been previously looted by Nazis I read Which makes you kind of nostalgic for the old Kind of the far right Like jackboots and an appreciation For the French Impressionists You don't get that with the Tommy Robinson lot

I can't believe you hate Renoir Right Are there other impressionists that you do like Yeah yeah Who are you into, ma'am? Well I mean, I've got quite like I quite like a lot of them I should

You like a little monnet? Yeah Not Yeah A bit of Yeah A lot of A lot of

Yeah A lot of A bit of Zazne Rory Bremler Yeah Of course Work with him for a long time I

I think I have seen I'm a fan Of both previous iterations Of the Thomas Crown Affair So the one with

Steve McQueen Yeah And then the one with The one from the I think I can't remember This is late 19th

Oh my God René Russo With René Russo Pierce Bros. Another film I saw quite a sensitive point in my development. René Russo made quite a strong impression on me, I'll say that for it. But yeah, both of those movies,

the sort of eponymous character is played by an incredibly suave man. And now there's actually a third one coming out with Michael B. Jordan as a lead. Again, another very beautiful, very suave man. That's not the Thomas Crown. We need nor deserve in 2026. We need this kind of art there.

This is the Thomas Crown Affair as re-made by our Adam Sandler. And him and Kevin James have tripped over and spilled a Renoir. That is, that's the slapstick art theft that we should have got. We don't need another charismatic, competent art thief. We need a buffoon. Yes, so, yeah, they took four Renoir paintings from a gallery in France,

but dropped two on the way out. Ren, wot, what, wah, wah, wah. And it's just the latest burglary from an impressionist art gallery. It's strapping everyone. It's understandable people who want to steal these things. They're valuable things. They're worth a lot of money. Oh, my God.

Oh, God. In fact, according to the King's only sister, the stolen pictures are worth 50 million pounds each. Says who? Says Anne. Good news. Good news. No pictures of sunflow were taken. Van Gogh for that. They only took four paintings.

They were planning to steal 50, but they decided that was simply too manet. Oh, my God. The getaway driver needed to use the toilet, which worried the other two, as they realized they might compromise their escape. Where's Florian? He's taken a piss. Ah, Ro. Oh, my God. You were doing so well in terms of keeping this to quite short setups and getting a reasonably recognisable joke out of them.

And I thought this is not the Andesol's what I know and love. And then you started on that sojourned into people taking a piss. And I thought now we're back to square one. Anyway, but anyway, they might have found the, I'm just looking at some of the CCTV footage they published now. I think I've spotted the thieves. Yes, I'm surat's them. Oh, my God. You started strong.

I've spotted them. Hard to see how they'll sell those paintings on, though. Everyone knows they're stolen goods. They're hot like a sausage on a barbecue. Sizzley, you might say. Might they try a second robbery? People are asking, might they say, We go again?

We go again. What the fuck was that? I'm not having that. I'm not having go again. It's not a vaguely work. Yes, it does. This is a classic impressionist pun. It's all as the hazy shape of the pun.

It doesn't have to be absolutely precise. size. The police have now surrounded the burglars there's an arm shown down and one of the heisters had just said they'll never

daygas alive. Oh God. Right. We need to finish this recording. It's easy to lose Lod Track of Time. There's always one more. There's always one more.

Lep track of time was good. You've always got to shake your dick to get the last drop to piss out. Or wiggle your vatch. All right. Yeah. Equal opportunities. Thank you.

Anyway. Well, I think I'll that the section in the bin that I delayed I'm now going to redelay till next year. Wait, is this the first ever bugle that's not going to have a section in the bin? There's not been many. I think we might have had the odd one where

there hasn't been, but there's been a bin in almost every bugle I think. This is extraordinary. This is we're making bugle history. This show still has New Grantampton for Anyway, so do tune in next week for the section in the bin. Anything to plug, Sarah?

Sure, I wouldn't mind if people followed me on social media. Sarah spelled Sarah Barron with two R's and then the number one million, a brilliant marketing strategy. Nish, are you on tour? I'm on tour in the UK and I'm actually not Ireland because I finished the island dates last week. I'm now on tour in the United Kingdom from now until the end of recorded time. So get tickets at nishcomad.comod.com.com.com.com. And actually, if you come to the gigs in Edinburgh and Glasgow, I will be supported by Sarah Barron. Tag team, baby, back again. Tag team back again.

So you could double up. Tickets at nishcoma.coma.coma.com.com. The return of my end of the year show, the certifiable history, it's happening this year at Soho Theatre and various other places in December and January. It's not on sale yet, but it will be soon. So do, yeah, consider this is an advance plug. Classic, also. It's on at the Soho Theatre and some other places. Tickets available and on.

Yeah, anon. Not right now. Not right. Soon. So see you all there. Bueglars and we'll be back next week. want to join the bugle voluntary subscription scheme to ensure that this show lasts beyond the end of

humanity that's coming in just a few years time, go to the buglepodcast.com and click the donate button.