The Bugle - THE BUGLE REVIEWS 2025, PART 1

Episode Date: December 30, 2025

What a year it has been Buglers. To truly make sense of this last 12 months we're taking a month by month look at what just happened. January to June went a bit like this. Hear more of our shows, buy our book, and help keep us alive by supporting us here: thebuglepodcast.com/This episode was produced by Chris Skinner and Laura Turner  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I will be in Australia for the next few weeks, hoping that the cricket can provide the distraction for everyone that it has so successfully provided for me since I was six years old. If you want to come to my shows, there is a bugle live in Melbourne on the 22nd of December where I'll be joined by Sammy Shaw and Lloyd Langford, and I'm doing the Zaltgeist, my stand-up show in Melbourne on the 23rd of December, and we've just added a possibly optimistic extra show in Sydney

on the 3rd of January. The 2nd of January show is sold out, but please, please come on the 3rd. My UK tour extension begins at the end of January, all details and ticket links at andesaltzman.com.com. special review or for any acronym users amongst you I'm Andy's Oxman and I have for the 19th consecutive calendar year appeared on 100% of the issues of the bugle

unlike some people I could mention Shakespeare for example Mary Cure and Julius Caesar to mention but two more I'm currently in Australia which is a sad and grieving place after the terrorist atrocity at Bondi yet another horrendous tragedy that has shaken and scarred this country and the rest of

world. The continuing rise of anti-Semitism, something I, like you, had sincerely hoped the human race would grow out of, along with other violent prejudices after the second millennium and specifically the 20th century had given them a really bad rap, has been one of the more disappointing aspects of yet another global shit heap of a year. This decade is going to have to pull up an Amazonian rainforest full of trees in its last four years if it wants to end up not failing completely and having to sit a retake, which, let's be honest, none of us wants to see. It's been a year that felt at times like a rerun and at other times like a whole new frontier of ludicrous human behaviour.

Let's jump straight into January now. Nish Kumar and Josh Gondromen join me as the world braced itself for Trump, Part 2. Top story! This quarter of a century so far, America is bracing itself for the onset of Donald Trump Mark 2. I never thought I'd be quite as disappointed, Josh, by hearing the word again so often. But Trump being inaugurated as president, disappointing enough the first time round. But almost infinitely more disappointing when you tag the word again on the end. We are just one week away now from Trump being re-inorated as president of what passes for the United States of America these days.

How are you bracing yourself for this, this time next week? Basically, it will be happening. It's been a tough time over here because Trump isn't the president currently, but he's causing all these international incidents already, such as the power of Trump that he's fucking up a job either a week and a half before he starts doing it or alternatively three years and 50 and a half weeks after he's stopped doing it. it's just chaos already i forgot how bad it would be before he started like last week he said he wanted to rename the gulf of mexico the gulf of america which is completely in keeping with his long-time strategy of slapping a new name on something that already exists that makes him sound responsible for it um he also suggested that the u.s should use military force to take control the panama canal which seems inadvisable because the canal is and a lot of people don't

know this in fucking Panama. It's fair shit. It's so bad. I could go on forever, but I want to cede the floor because I'm, it's, he's also, he was sentenced to, um, for his crimes for all the felonies he was convicted of last week. And he was sentenced to, um, uh, unconditional discharge, which doesn't sound like much. But you should know that if your experience.

unconditional discharge for more than four consecutive hours you should call your gun. I was bringing back a joke from the early odds for this. Family show. Family show. But, I mean, the good news is he's about to embark on a criminal rehabilitation program through which, in an effort to get his life back on track and out of the world of crime, he's being given a four-year work placement in the White House as president. You know, the progress in the American justice system to see that there is hope you can rehabilitate offenders.

I think that's a good big stuff. I honestly think, given America's use of basically slave labor of incarcerated people, they should make Trump go fight the wildfires in California. I feel like that would, it wouldn't justify the program, but it would put a little slap a new coat of paint on it. Yes, America's favorite sex offender and fraudster has been warming up ahead of getting his clammy paws back on the nuclear football. That is not a reassuring phrase. and having four more years to cantankerize

his country to smithereens. I mean, launching basically verbal wars with numerous non-enemies of America. I mean, searching for logic in the 21st century is a fool's error in France. He'd be taking these scattergun verbal pot shots at various places in the region he thinks of as the rest of the world is done.

Besides the ones you mentioned, he talked about dissolving the border with Canada. Now, Nish, I know you have, your partner is family from Canada, I mean, are they excited by this problem? Well, my partner's actually half her family's from Canada and the other half's from America, or to update this for two months' time, my partner's family is from America. And I think her newly American family welcome the arrival of Donald Trump as the new president of Canada.

it's yeah it's we're in very much we're about a week away from what i can only describe as the political equivalent of alvin and the chipmunks the squeakle in that it is a second installment of a franchise when no one wanted the first one to happen so how we've ended up in a situation of donald trump the squeak rule is simply beyond uh beyond comprehension uh last Tuesday, he gave a press conference of Mar-a-Lago, a building whose interior decor could only be described as Saddam Sheik. And he was asked to give assurances that he wouldn't use military force or economic sanctions. He said, I can't assure you on either of those two. But I can say this, we need them for economic security. The them in question, he was referring to both

the Panama Canal and also Greenland, the country. I, sometimes there are moments in your life where you just can't believe what you're watching and you're starting to believe that a nightmare you had six months ago has been made real as part of Make a Dream Come Through Day. But, so this week he said he began his charm offensive by sending Donald Jr. to Greenland. And to be fair to Donald Jr., that is a man

who is yet to see a mountain of snow he couldn't snore. Sending it to the Arctic feels. our best dangerous. His logic behind claiming the Panama Canal is that it was originally for the American military. He said the Panama Canal was built for our military. It's being operated by China. We gave the Panama Canal to Panama. We didn't give it to China. His logic seems to be that the Panama Canal was originally American. And what I would say is that if you are a white American, you don't want to start pulling at the thread of giving things back to the people who originally under because I imagine there's quite a few indigenous tribes in America that might

have something to say along similar lines. There's huge strategic importance to Greenland as a country. So it's currently technically ruled by Denmark, but it's got its own kind of sovereignty at the core of its legal system. But it has a huge sort of diplomatic significance. And one of the key elements to it is that it's going to have some shipping routes opening up within it. Now, the reason those shipping routes are opening up is because of, you guessed it, global warming. So we're going to deal with the effects of global warming by doing more things to increase global warming. We are, as a species, about to attempt to shit through diarrhea. Moving on to February now

And Tiff Stevenson and Anuvab Pal were with me As Germany joined the ranks of nations Lurching inexplicably and regrettably to the right Top story this week, Germany has voted And it has got things very right The most right it has been since the war So I've translated that from a German news website And I don't speak German

So I might not be 100% accurate But we'll have to go with that it's uh yes i've been slightly weird times that we're living in democratically um in which um the far right a fd party in germany got 21% of the vote this is a party many of whose senior figures have not been quite as definitely not nazis as would be ideal for anyone who's uh ever heard of or read anything about the 20th century um i guess on the plus side the 21% we've probably still got a few happy years until they fully take over Germany. So let's cling to that.

Tiff, you are our German electoral politics correspondent. Congratulations. I'm being appointed to that. Is it the blonde hair and the blue eyes? I feel this is unfair. I've always said, you know, Hitler would struggle with me

because, you know, I've got the blonde hair blue eyes, but I am actually part Romani. So I am part gypsy. So, you know, he'd be like, fuck me, kill me. Basically, the same dilemma that every man I've ever anyway

well look I mean I've bought up we've started talking about we've started talking about Hitler I hate to go reducto ad Hitler but I think when talking about German political parties it's probably a fair

because you know there's been a lot of discussion about whether or not the AFD are indeed far right and some arguments to say they're not, but then apparently the party's youth wing and certain regional factions of that have been flagged by Germany's domestic intelligence agency as suspected extremist groups,

although the party as a whole isn't officially classified that way. But German politics and the word youth, when combined, are never really the greatest sign, are they? No, slightly tainted a combination historically, I guess. Anna, what have you made of Germany's right-word drift in recent? recently. So the biggest party in the election was the centre-right C-D-U-C-S-U coalition led by Friedrich Mertz

with 29-29%. They've said they will not go into coalition with the AFD. So I guess that's another plus to cling to. You know, 79% of German voters who voted did not vote for the far-rights, anti-learning, even a hint of a lesson from history, AFD party. and his impressively hypocritical leader, Alice Vidal.

I'm sorry for massing up pronunciations here. But what have you made of it watching on from the first safer distance? You know, I think it's an interesting world to be in where the BBC World podcast in the morning, I was listening to it said, it could have been the fascists. It was nearly the fascists, but eventually it wasn't. That can't be a way in which we bigoted our day. You know, the way for humanity to progress in 2025 should be more than it's not Hitler.

You know, I think after all this time, I think we should be able to say a few more things than it's not Hitler. Like, it can be anything, you know, it's a cyclist, it's a pickleball player, but it's not Hitler should not be the gauging mechanism for relief anywhere in the world. I mean, Trump immediately took credit for it, didn't he? Because he said, like, oh, you know, looked like the Conservative Party won bigly because they're like us, sort of forgetting that Musk and Vance actually backed the AFD, like quite vocally and openly. And I guess even comparatively with this party in Germany is more left wing than, you know, the Republicans are. The conservative is sort of center left, is it not? Like, is the left wing on a different plane altogether?

that. It's not... I've long since given up trying to understand left and right. I never really understood it in the first place. It never made any sort of logical sense to me, left and right. Now I think, I don't know, all the old, all the old certainties have just evaporated away in a spray of musky and piss, frankly. The weird thing is that when you categorise any group of people, after a while, the English language stops mattering. Like, for example, for example, Recently when Elon Musk was talking to the FFT, one of the things that came up was that, you know, we're against immigrants and people who look like immigrants. And I thought to myself, that could just be a tourist. The incumbent Chancellor Olaf Schultz bagged just 16% of the vote for the Social Democrats, their sausage, sorry, read that wrong, their worst since the Second World War.

Yes. I didn't go near at worst pun because I knew I knew that you would go there and I didn't even go for they might be sauerkraut about losing I didn't even I didn't even go there you're more disciplined than I am there will be weeks and months of negotiations before a coalition is officially formed obviously in Britain we had a couple of elections after which we dabbled in negotiations for coalitions and it did not suit us with at all. Not our game discussing compromise and cooperation. That's not what politics is supposed to be

about. But obviously they're slightly more used to it in Germany. So it still remains to be seen exactly how this will, how all the pieces will fall into place. But yeah, I guess as a fan of humanity, not drifting to the right politically. Slightly worrying times across Europe. Now for something a little more light-hearted, that's a low bar. In March, we had a look at the happiest places on Earth. Ria Lina and Neil Delamere were with me to give their take on what makes a place happy. Top story this week. Finland is the happiest place in the known universe.

The annual World Happiness Report has shown that Finland, for the eighth year in a row, is the happiest country on earth. and from all the evidence we have from anywhere in the universe which it doesn't appear to be an absolute hotbed of happiness. Now, before we go into the what makes a country happy or not,

we should probably have a quick look at the history of human happiness. It's a question that's been troubling or fascinating humanity since the very dawn of evolution when a little fishy in the big old sea thought I don't like being wet all the time and had a crack at moving on to land and making some changes to its life.

Fair play. The ancient Greeks took a bit of time, time out from naked wrestling and pornographic pottery to contemplate the meaning and nature of happiness and seemed to come to the conclusion that it largely involved naked wrestling and pornographic pottery with a bit of epic blood-soaked high body count slasher fancy romance drama on the side. Have we moved on the intervening two and a half thousand years? I don't think we have. After the collapse of Greek civilization, politics and religion came to the conclusion that the best thing to do was to try to eradicate as much happiness from as many people as possible

and did so successfully for most of the intervening couple of millennia until the 1960s came along and a rather bizarre school of thought flickered into life under which people should be able to do what they want with their lives. This rapidly transmuted into the unlicensed private school of thought that rich, powerful people should be able to do what they want with other people's lives. And here we are today. So, what do you guys make of this continuing triumph of Finland over all other countries on earth in terms of happiness? I think it's a lie. I don't know. I think they're just the best at whipping their people into answering the questionnaire, the way I want an answer. I just, I don't know. Don't get me wrong.

Finland's absolutely gorgeous. I love it. For about three days a year in the middle of July, it's a joy. But for the rest of the year, I mean, there's a reason they don't talk very much. It's too cold to open your mouth. Your tongue will freeze. You know, and they're also, they're right there next to Russia. Maybe, maybe they answered the questionnaire right after they were let into NATO and they were having a particularly good day. They were just like, oh, thank goodness, you know. the coalition of the willing

is going to come to our aid if Russia turns their attention to us but I don't know I just I'm not sure I'm not sure I believe that that said I recognize that my theory that they've been whipping their citizens into answering this questionnaire falls down by the fact that China isn't

even in the top 10 because if anyone is going to make their populace if they want to answer them it would have been China China unsurprisingly does not rate highly in happiness or in benevolent measures. They are not listed in top countries

for helping strangers, returning lost wallets, volunteering, donating, none of those things. Unsurprisingly, Afghanistan's bottom, where they even, which I was amazed at, had a score for the women. They even said, even the women are unhappy. And I went, again, I don't believe you're allowed to speak to them to find out.

So, I don't know, I have some issues with the report. But what I thought was really funny is that one of the ways that, One of the ways that I'm a scientist, okay? I'm always interested in the metrics. How are you judging this? And one of the things, the metrics is how likely is your wallet to be returned by a neighbor? And the Netherlands is top in how likely.

And I was like, now I don't want to live in the Netherlands. I know Netherlands isn't the top 10 a happy, but I'm not going to feel comfortable if I know that my neighbors are constantly stealing my wallet. And then coming around and returning it to make themselves feel better. Oh, that is deeply suspicious. That is a deeply suspicious view of the world, really, deeply suspicious. No, it's just logical.

Like, why are your neighbours returning at the most? I mean, how many times has your wallet fallen out of your pocket in your own garden? And your neighbor, who just happened to be trimming the hedge goes, oh, I'll return that to Neil later. I've been married for 10 years. I no longer controlled my wallet. I'm not let near where wallet. I have handed it stif end

at the end of every week and that is all I know. It's basically money is put into the prison commissary for me and I spend it on razors and toilet paper and that's it. I've been to Finland. I like the fin. I think they're happy.

Eight years in a row though Andy, it's a farmer's league. It's a farmer's league at this point. Even PSG having won at eight times in a row. I'm against nation states getting involved in this sort of competition. The Finns are delight with themselves in my experience and Annie Panto, six of the seven dwarves are named Happy at this point.

McDonald's most popular meal is just called the Meal in Finland because all meals in Finland are happy. The Fonz's sitcom was called Days. Ferell Williams' biggest song has no name in Helsinki. And what's really important in this is, okay, the Finns did well, but Ireland was the 20th, happiest country. And then we started the UK was 24th, and we immediately jumped five places to the 15th,

country. That is how we measure it. Other countries have fallen down the rankings. One of the reasons apparently is because particularly Americans now, they don't eat together anymore and eating together is one of those things that creates this sort of social cohesion. And it is hard to argue with that. If you look at the stats, like, for example, like 12 hours of 13 people were delighted at the last supper. I mean, one had a lot on his mind. He was a bit worried about what was about to come. But all of this kind of leaves two questions. One, why are they happy and two what the

more do the Italians want? What do they want? They've got the best food, the best wine, the best language, the best climate, the best art, the most beautiful people.

They've created Roberto Baggio and Isabella Rossellini. What more do you want? You've been beaten by countries for a dark six months of the year. Grow a pair,

put nine out of ten on the farm and we could all be happy. You're clearly the winner. You most. More money bastards. As you would probably have expected, after March came April. Hurricane Bolo and Anuvab join me as Canada raised its middle finger and pointed it directly towards Washington, D.C.

Top story this week. Canada says, go f*** yourself to the American presidents, albeit indirectly by voting for its own parliament. The country that gave the world, Margaret Atwood, author of the predictive historical non-fiction classic, the Handmaid's Tale, has swung conclusively behind absolutely whoever was not the most Trump-like candidate. Mark Carney, the self-styled thinking technocratic bankers, technocratic banker, managed to lead the recently beleaguered Liberal Party to victory, having taken over from Justin Trudeau's Prime Minister and Liberal leader just a month and a half ago when the Liberals were lagging in the polls.

The Conservative leader Pierre Pollyev had been expected to become the next Prime Minister before, A, Carney took over from Trudeau, and B, Donald Trump and his maelstrom of mayhem made Canada think, hang on, is a pro-Trump-Trumplian Trump-alike, definitely right for Canada now? And they came up with the answer, no, it f***ing isn't. So, A, well done, Canada. B, thank you, Canada, and C, those are two very, very low bars that you've crossed to get gratitude and congratulations. I know both of you have been voting numerous times in the Canadian election to help Canada avoid becoming the 51st state of the U.S. Which is so absurd, the idea that it'll be the 51st state, because the size of Canada, you can divvy up that baby for at least another 20 states.

One state, that's ridiculous. Why do you think, Harry, that Canada is a nation of 40 million people with vast natural resources. It's in the top 10 to 12 richest countries in the world on most measures. Why do you think it did not fancy the idea of being the new North Dakota? But why have they turned against that alluring opportunity? I think it's stage fright. I think they like being behind the scenes. I think they like kind of not having the pressure of being part of the U.S.

You know, it's hard. You know, you're at, it's like saying Robin, do you want to take over for Batman? It's like, well, I'm not used to that. I'm used to being Robin. I don't have any special utility belts. and I don't even know how to drive. He's always driving me around. Like, it's, no, it's stage fright.

They're afraid. They're afraid of taking it. But that's, you know, I don't blame him. It's big. It's big to be the new North Dakota. That's asking a lot. Annavab, obviously this, Canada's essential rejection of Trump's invitation to join the USA has left the way open for India to become the 51st state of America. and eventually, you know, through sheer weight of numbers,

take over the USA and incorporate it as a small part of Uttar Pradesh. So, I mean, this again, it's, you know, the pieces are constantly shifting in the modern global political landscape. They are indeed, Andy. In fact, if you visit parts of New Jersey, I think it already has happened. I think there is a significant takeover. But this, I'm fascinated by a different thing. I don't think too many central bankers have won world elections.

And if I'm not wrong, Mark Carney was the central banker of your country, Andy. He was, yes. Saw it through the COVID pandemic. And it is nearly unheard of that a foreign person would become the head of a central bank. But Britain, I think, is quite open to who its central bankers are as technocrats. But as far as I've always been open to overseas people taking high positions in our country, whether that's manager of England football team or indeed monarch, if we go back to the 18th century and various other times for history.

So that's the thing. You incorporate skill sets. And his essential, from what I read, his essential claim was that I was a really good central banker, which is not the sexiest election campaign. especially if they've just had Justin Trudeau. But that clearly was enough. So that's how much they hate anything to do with Donald Trump, clearly. Yes.

And in fact, the Conservative leader, Pierre Polyev, appears to have lost his seat as we record. He was certainly projected to do that. I don't know if it's been confirmed yet. And to really rub it in, this is his seat was the Carlton constituency near Ottawa. To really rub it in, he lost it to a liberal candidate who sounds, and I can't work out if he sounds like a. an AI-generated cartoon Trump supporter or an AI-generated person

to make Trump supporters angry. He's called Bruce Fanjoy. To even further to even further rubber in for right-wing Trumprants, Bruce Fanjoy lives in a carbon-neutral home. He built himself. Anyway,

for those of us who have been struggling with some of the results of global democracy of late, this is a better one. certainly. He sounds like a bedding app. I would bet on that app. That sounds like it would be like cricket betting app. That sounds like a bit. You know, what of Mark Carney speeches? I was listening yesterday. He spent 20 minutes talking about interest rates, how he manages interest rates. And people were going crazy like it was some sort of an erotic speech. Well, like everything is changing. You know, people have, I think there is

a demand, not just for sort of blandness, I think people want active tedium now in politics. I think going beyond just being a bit neutral and non-committal but they want someone who can talk like a central banker about stuff that central bankers talk about. Trump's influence over worldwide elections

showed no signs of slowing down as we entered the month of not particularly Mary May. David O'Don and Alice Fraser were here to try and make sense of it all. Top story this week. Global voters revolt against and revolts in favour of Donald Trump. It's been a bit of a weird time for global democracy. We reported last week on Canada, decisively voting against Trump. Australia has followed suit this week, whilst the UK and Romania have slightly gone the other way. I mean, let's have a look at Australia first, Alice.

a federal election sort of wholesale rejection of the right-wing Liberal Party Anthony Albanesean Labour have won another term in office albeit it's only a three-year term in Australia because I don't know attention spans are shorter I think

but Yes and upside down Yeah that's a of course time goes the other way and Peter Dutton the CGI generated cartoon Badi leader of the Liberals became the first federal opposition leader to lose their seat in a federal election.

So, I mean, what is what is the feeling in Australia, this momentous? Is this Australia's effort to not put Trump back in his box, but to, I don't know, kick the box out across the seat? Well, you know, our defiant anti-Trump sentiment in Australia is of course leavened by the fact that our only national defense policy is to, to hope that the Americans save us, if anything goes wrong. So we've got to be defiant in a cheeky, charming way that will make them want to keep us around. But Albanese's labour has won emphatically across the spread, strong swings for labour across all of the states and territories.

They've got a majority government's 86 seats. That means they get to kind of run the country the way that they want to. I understand that for people who do not live in, Australia and do not understand Australian politics. This might be difficult to understand Dutton versus Albanese. So just imagine Albanese, while not being Trump, is less Trump than Dutton, who is also not Trump, but is sort of Trumping. He's trying, he's sort of doing the performative cruelty thing.

He sort of ponses around cackling wildly and stroking a cat. It doesn't do that. He says it's very difficult for a leader of a party to lose. their seat, they always tend to install the leaders in the safest liberal seats, but it shows like a real swing against, not just the party, but against him as a person, not just, not just him as a political figure, but just, it's the equivalent of people coming and putting their bottoms on his window. Like, it's a really, like, not just fuck you, but fuck you, and the horse you rode in on, and the road that your horse rode in on, and the cart behind the horse

as well. They don't, they don't want it. We don't want it. We don't like it. It's going to be an interesting next couple of years, I would say, depending on what mandate Labor thinks this voting indicates that they have. I saw a constituent in Dutton's constituency saying, for some reason, he didn't come across as a personable leader. I mean, could that reason possibly be everything he's ever said and done? Well, genuinely, it makes you realize how talented and charming Trump is because Dutton was saying more or less the same sorts of things

and when he said them you could actually hear how awful they were. I thought it was interesting when Trump did one of his, you know, his helicopter interviews where it sounds like he's blow-drying his own pubs. And in it he said that Albanese was a special friend. and then when someone put Dutton's name to him, he said he had no idea who that was. But during the campaign, Dutton had said that he had Trump's phone number, which is absolutely intriguing that I don't know, maybe Trump saved it in 2011, like one of those people you used to play football with, but it's just mysterious in your phone as Peter Football or Dutton Old. I mean, after the Canadian election, in which, you know, a lot of people sort of blame the conservative collapse and their leader lost his seat, as we reported last week, exclusively

for the world. No one else picked up on that, interestingly, not even in Canada. So you're very lucky we're here. That's a further reason to join the Bugle voluntary subscription scheme to keep this fearless journalism going for the world. Anyway, many people blame the conservative collapse on Trump. And Trump himself, gave an interview in the Atlantic sadly that was in the magazine the Atlantic not in the middle of the ocean before sinking to his bottom

in which he took credit stroke I have his phone number I think he took credit and or debit I don't know which way you look at it for the Canadian public swing against the most Trumpic candidate

so interesting interesting times on that subject Andy it's interesting that it's the classic mixup of the Atlantic versus the Atlantic but it is most people don't know the Time magazine is called Time Magazine because it used to come out every five minutes

and people would check the time on the top of it that was the only means available in the pre-clock era listen and learn being listen and learn I mean I want to talk about the trumpet of Patriots party in Australia but that's just my own personal annoyance because they've texted me like 15 times like I'm conscious that nobody outside of Australia is aware of the kind of small interneissan politics within Australia because

Australia's main two parties are very close to one another because we have compulsory voting so no one has to frighten anyone else into the polling booths so everyone's sort of aligned on things like a horrific immigration policy situation and being in the pocket of big mining but they sort of differ on other policy points but we have other parties we have Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party, which is a party of a lady who became famous for saying racist things in a chip shop and only went downhill from there. A very early viral win, Pauline Hanson, manages to have spoken in public and said the most horrendous things while sounding like she was on the verge of tears for coming up on 40 years now. It was her Gettysburg address in that chip shop that nobody forget. In future, secondary school students will have to learn off every word of it, I hope not.

I mean, extraordinary. We also have the Libertarian Party, of course. We have the newly named trumpet of Patriots Party, where they put the trumpet of the trumpet in bold, and they text you 15 times a day. And unfortunately, that did not work. out for them because they are also Clive Palmer's pocket party after the Clive Palmer party

previously put forward by Clive Palmer failed. But he has billions of dollars so why not spend it texting fucking me at 3 o'clock in the morning? Saying racist things in a chip shop, coincidentally, is also currently the world's biggest selling podcast

with 4.3 billion listeners it started last week and it's ending next week. Come on, Andy. just asking questions in a chip shop. Come on, just asking questions. Just asking questions in the hilarious accent of the people who run the chip shop.

And finally for this episode in June, Felicity Ward and James Nekisei join me for an Australasio-Pacific edition of the bugle. Felicity set the scene early on with the admission that she had no clue what was going on. There is so little of what I understand when I come on this show. So little.

She's here to feel dumb. That's my purpose. I'm like, sure that I hope no one knows this. I hope it's not just me. Look, I see the purpose of the bugle as to not just entertain, but to educate. And, you know, it's very much the BBC's Reithian values. And to be honest, young people today don't know enough about, don't know enough about 1950s snooker and

you know if no one else is better the problem is Andy I'm from New Zealand it's going to be a comedy club gig where some dude's going to stand up and go oi I'm McLanacley's great grandson and you are mates a dickhead and then what do I do with that mate? What do I do? That's true

I've got to say I really perked up when you included honey badges I'm like now I'm listening let's talk I love honey badges They're like the animal equivalent of a hobbit where once they've eaten, they're evolutionarily, like their intent, the next thing they think about is where their next meal comes from. All they think about is eating. It is extraordinary. And they have no regard for their physical health.

They are so interested in eating sweet things. I don't know how many documentaries he watched on Honey Badgers. I watched a few. If you couldn't tell. And watching them look at an entire beehive and go, this isn't going to be good, but I do love funny. And then they go in and they're just getting in start to fucking dead. They're like, God damn it, this is really on me, but I love honey.

And then there's an amazing part. This is the best. This is one of my favorite things of any documentary ever. A honey badger started eating a snake. And the snake kept biting him in the face. but the honey badger had like a locked jaw and was like eating his body and both of them just slowly dying figuring out who is going to die full and you think they're both dead and like the documentarian who's been following this particular honey badger for like three years is crying

it's like two hours later she's figuring out what to do and then the honey badger was actually just paralysed by the snake the honey badger comes to looks around and the first thing it does goes that's right, I was in the middle of lunch. I'm yum, yum, yum, yum, and then continues to eat the snakes. That's basically a metaphor for the history of human commerce, I think. That's capitalism.

Have we got time for the top story? No, I think if you just want to do some plugs, then we can wrap and go home, yeah. Don't get me started on honey budges. That's the same as getting Andy started on history or cricket. I'm out. Can we keep this show focused? No.

When have I ever been focused? Well, a top story now. And it's almost like we're desperately trying to avoid the appalling realities of the world. I mean, it has been another tricky week. for the Northern Hemisphere of war, brutality, failure, human rights, atrocities,

genocide and genocide-related pedantry, winning out once again over hope, truth, happiness and the idea of human progress. So instead for our top story this week, we're popping south of the equator for New Zealand news now. And James, I mean,

we joke about war maybe too often on this podcast, but New Zealand is on the brink of what could be a defining conflict. between Fur Patrol and the government. Fur Patrol being, as I'm sure you'll explain, a prominent rock group. Yes, it's all coming up, Milhouse, as we say over here.

Andy, the Fur Patrol, now there's a lot of different names here, so I'll try and summarize. Essentially, the Altiero New Zealand Music Awards was last week. The leader of the house, Chris Bishop, was at those awards. We are unsure if he was there as the leader, of the house, of the government, or as just a fan, because he was wearing a Fur Patrol t-shirt. During this awards, there was a performance

by a beloved Māori artist called Stan Walker. Now, it's been an interesting time for Māori in New Zealand, so there was quite a lot of Māori-pro-Mauri paraphernalia during his performance. The leader of the house, he did not like this, and he may or may not have been drunk, but he was definitely holding a beer while wearing his Fur Patrol t-shirt. He said very loudly, what a load of crap.

Now, he went on quite loudly about this all being a load of crap to the point where an older gentleman turned around and said, shut up, dickhead. And now that is the worst insult you can say in New Zealand culture. It's a bit like Australian rules for us sea bombs as far as the eye can see. But if you call someone a dickhead and you mean it, that's a fight. So what we've now got is the leader of the house calling him a prominent Māori musicians performance crap while wearing a fur patrol t-shirt.

And this old gentleman has called him a dickhead. And it turns out this old gentleman is a guy called Don McGlashen from a famous New Zealand band called the Mutton Birds. And he is beloved. I'm not sure what the English, it's a bit like Cliff Richard calling someone a dick, dickhead. You don't expect to hear the word dickhead come out of his mouth, but to be called a dickhead by Cliff Richard would just haunt you for the rest of your life. So Don McGlashing calling the leader of the house a dickhead about heckling a Māori performer. It's national

news. The deputy prime minister has come in and said that obviously it's the leader of the house is right to say that it might be crap. It could have been crap. Art is subjective. The prime minister has weighed in and said that the leader of house has always been a big fan of New Zealand. The Prime Minister has weighed in on this. I cannot stress that enough. It is as close to Civil War as New Zealand

has been. To add Field to Fire Patrol, the people on the T-shirt have come out and said, even though he was wearing our T-shirt, we do not in any way, shape or form support him saying that things were crap. This could be deferred New Zealand civil war after, of course,

the Māori Wars and the Ork, Alvin Wars of the early 2000s. Obviously. So things are very tight here. The Leader of Ports, Pritsbishop, has come out and said, in hindsight, he probably shouldn't have said anything out loud. That is the most New Zealand's result that we could possibly have, and that it is probably

a tie. Could I just say I did actually read about this, and I read, I was like, okay, it just kept, as you said, it just kept building and building and building. And at the end of it, all I could think is, and they call women emotional. Like, just, ugh, uh, uh. Well, there you go. What are six months they were. I know you're on the edge of your seats, desperate to hear what happened in the second half of the year.

Well, good news. July to December will be in your pod feed very soon, featuring the long-awaited return of former bugle co-host, John. What's this complicated name? Oliver, I will be in Australia for the next few weeks, hoping that the cricket can provide the distraction for everyone that it has so successfully provided for me since I was six years old. If you want to come to my shows, we've just added a possibly optimistic extra show in Sydney on the 3rd of January.

The 2nd of January show is sold out, but please, please, please come on the third. My UK tour extension begins at the end of January. All details and ticket links at andesaltzman.co.uk. Remember, you can join our Bugle Voluntary Subscription Scheme at the Bugle. pugelpodcast.com, thanks to all of you who have done so already, and enabled the bugle to stay free, flourishing, devoid of advertisements and fully independent for yet another year. Until next week, goodbye.