The Chaser Report - Astra Wheneca? | Nina Oyama

Episode Date: July 1, 2021

What's the vaccine advice now, exactly? Who knows? And who'd take medical advice from a comedy podcast anyway? Also, James Schloeffel tells us why he can't gloat at Sydney's lockdown, Dan Ilic farewells Donald Rumsfeld, and we vicariously drink with Nina Oyama. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report for Friday, the 2nd of July, 2021. This is the Delta variant of the podcast. And as ever in this variant, my co-host is the wonderful Dan Illich of the Irrational Fear podcast. Hello, Dan. Dom, it's great to be with you. I can't believe we're still up to Delta. I was really hoping we'd be up to golf or hotel by now, much nicer variants.

I'm also hanging out for whiskey, or the whiskey variant. It's going to be my favourite one, I bet. You've just revealed something. There's going to be a hotel version of COVID. We are so fucked. That's going to be the Australian variant. The Morrison government's going to want to have their quarantine facilities in place before we get to the hotel variant.

Oh, my God. Because otherwise the news is going to be a little too crazy. It really is. All right. Heaps of things on the show today, Dan. We're going to check in with Nina Ayama about how she's traveling during the Sydney lockdown. I gather there's been some problems for Nina. Yeah, poor Nina.

Also, we're going to be heading to Melbourne to talk with James Schleffel from the shovel to find out how Victorians are enjoying this unique moment. We have a very special moment from New Zealand politics across the ditch. And I will be going through the known-nones of Donald Rumsfeld's life. But first, let's go to Rebecca Dana-Muno in the Chaser Newsroom. Prime Minister Scott Morrison addressed the country's lackluster response to the COVID outbreak by announcing a program that will shift blame for COVID away from himself. In a press conference, the PM dubbed the new program Blamemaker,

which will give state governments and everyday Australians the blame for Morrison's failures. Esteemed warmonger Donald Rumsfeld has passed away at the age of 88 following a lifelong battle with the Middle East. In honour of his passing, war criminals across the globe have come together in solidarity as a symbol of thanks to the man who showed them their lives have meaning, and innocent civilian lives don't. Dole recipient Jerry Harvey has rejoiced today after learning that the government plans to provide

further COVID relief payments for struggling small businesses. In celebration, the Harvey Norman CEO busted out the champagne and caviar and announced he would let workers blink on company time without doxing their pay for the next 24 hours. That's the latest news from the Chasers' Work From Home News Desk. I'm in bed watching Netflix. And as we head into the weekend, Dan, we know two things at the same time. One, that any adult can get the AstraZeneca vaccine, and two, that the vast majority of experts say

that people under the age of 60 should not get the AstraZeneca vaccine. We have a potential for more vaccine than we've ever had before in this country, potentially turning the roll out around and yet at the same time our most trusted experts saying for fuck's sake, don't get the vaccine Australia. What the hell do we do, Dan? I don't know.

I don't mind this so much. It's a bit like smoking or drinking. You know, we know it's bad for you, but we do it anyway. And I think this is great for Australians. Australians love a smoke and a drink. So you tell Australia's not to do something and Australians are most likely wanting to go out and do it. It's kind of reverse psychology

and I really appreciate this from the government. They've gone to 12-dimension chess school to work this one out, and I love it. I think it's great. Yeah, and it's just fascinating watching the different beats of this and how they slap each other down and contradict each other. And particularly Jeanette Young, who is the chief health officer of Queensland, has been incredibly evocative in going, you know, I don't want the first 18-year-old in Queensland to die in the pandemic to die from the vaccine rather than COVID. Do you know the one thing that was keeping the boomers from going and getting the that they're all supposed to have had by now.

Being scared of dying from it, Dan. So well done, Chief Health Officer. Just absolutely nailing it in terms of encouraging people to go out and get it. Well, I think the winner here are boomers, because boomers are going to be living a lot longer than the young people who will eventually get COVID and die. But the sad thing is there's not going to be enough young people to rent the houses that all the boomers own.

So that's going to be, you know, swings and roundabouts for boomers on this one. This reminds me, Dan, of the bushfire crisis. Do you remember that bizarre moment where he'd, just come back from overseas, just like this, everything had turned to shit, and he tried another quick fix. He went, oh, let's get the army in to sort this out. And within about five minutes, the head of the rural fire service in New South Wales had come out and said, no, we don't want the army. That will make things worse. That's a terrible idea. Why didn't you tell me? This happened right off the National Cabinet, and everyone who was at that meeting clearly

was taken by surprise. So whenever the PM tries to do a quick fix, it makes things worse. But the weird thing about this, Dan, is I think he didn't actually change anything. The rule has always been that if you wanted to go and talk to your GP, the GP could sign off if the GP wanted to. Is that right? I just wasn't recommended. I never understood that. I never, as someone who is 39 and six months off from being 40, I was always under the

impression that, no, I can't get any vaccine because the Pfizer one doesn't exist and I'm ill eligible for the AstraZeneca. You know, I just did something very foolish, Dan. I tried to make a definitive statement about the state of the vaccine roll out in Australia. That is deemed to failure. All I know is you can go and talk to you. your GP and ScoMo will pay for it. So go and talk to your GP about how shit this whole situation is and how much has been fucked up by the federal government. Well, the number one

tenet of acting like a Prime Minister, according to Scott Morrison, is absolving himself of any kind of decision-making. So he's absolutely done that with this. This is classic Scott Morrison. It's not his problem. It's the problem of the States. Now it's not the problem of the States. It's the problem for your GP. So he's actually passed the buck all the way back down. The only way trickle-down economics works in Australia is when Scomo passes the buck. all the way down to your local GP. I don't hold a hose, mate. I don't hold a syringe, mate.

I'm just completely responsible for the entirety of the vaccine rollout. Yeah, no, this is classic Scott Morrison. He's not responsible for anything. He's something I did yesterday, Dom. I don't know if this is illegal. I took Scott Morrison's publicly available email and I went to the Harvard Kennedy School of Politics and I signed him up to 10 different email lists

so he can get information about how to create public policy. And you can do this too. If you want to take Scott Morrison's email address, you can go to Oxford, Cambridge, on Ash, and sign him up to do some courses on how to actually be a politician. Or just sign him up for promotional emails from Engadine Mackers. Today's episode of The Chaser Report is brought to you by Windows 11. The most crash-proof edition, yeah.

At this point in the COVID-19, Delta crisis. Just about all of Australia is under some sort of lockdown or restrictions, except for one place, a bastion of normal life. Why is Victoria always okay when the rest of us is in lockdown? James Schleffel of the Shovel joins us once more. Hello, James. Good day, guys.

How are you going? It's a very weird feeling being in Victoria right now. I've got to tell you, it feels like there's been some kind of mistake. Remember the Academy Awards a few years ago when they read out the wrong best picture? They said La La Land instead of moonlight. It's a bit like that. You know, they've said the states are going to lockdown in New South Wales. And we're all just waiting for them to say, no, no, sorry.

There's been a mistake exactly Victoria. Could it be a sort of freaky Friday type, you know, Lindsay Lohan situation? Maybe. I don't know. But I'm telling you, we are feeling a little bit smug because we've had a rough couple of years. And it does feel nice to finally not be the state that's being shot on. But look, we're clearly not all in this together. other way around. But James as well,

the conquering hero returns. Dan Andrews has conquered not only COVID a number of times last year, but now his own back, it seems. Well, hang on the second there's on. I mean, Dan Andrews did appear to return this week, but is it actually Dan Andrews or is it his body double?

Let's not jump to conclusions here. There's a lot of very convincing theories on the web at the moment. But do you know actually who is most pleased that Dan Andrews is back? Who's that? News Corp. News Corp because they totally ran out of content when he had to go on Dick Lee's.

Without 80 pieces of content, shooting on Dan Andrews every day, all they had was like a puff piece about Scott Morrison building a Togola, but they didn't have anything else to write. I didn't enjoy one News Corp headline I saw on the front page of the Australian, which was his back and then very small text next to it, whether you like it or not. Have they started James waxing lyrical about the grand days of the Molino premiership? And just sort of going, what a competent man he was. I hate Dan Andrews being back. I haven't seen that yet, but it's only a matter of time.

And how has it been for Victorians? How has his performance this week shone through? We saw at the start of the week. He was out there on a construction site in high viz and hard hat. He was telling everyone about his spine that definitely exists. And how do you think Victorians have taken this week? I don't know. I think we've been so just smug and obsessed and, you know,

with looking at other states that we haven't really even looked at Dan Andrews. We've been looking at other states. And look, I do notice that, you know, Gladys is doing a good job over there. A bit of stick early on. But I think she's doing a great job. And I actually thought it's quite a good decision of her last week when she decided to extend the borders of the Sydney lockdown to include all of Western Australia as well.

Well, Perth is basically part of Western Sydney, isn't it? I mean, if you just keep going. Exactly. Yeah. I've always said Alice Springs is the cheapest place to buy in Sydney. And I'm really excited that we've extended out. board is that far. Now James, this is the point in the conversation where it's completely, you can have a free kick. What are the amazing lifestyle things you've been doing while we've

been reacquainting ourselves with our sort of own four walls? You know what? I'd love to say that I've been going out and kind of making the most of it. But I think there's this kind of Pavlovian response that when there's this talk of lockdown that you just kind of shut yourself in your house. What? I know. Isn't it terrible? I think we're just so conditioned to it that we struggle But look, maybe this weekend is the time to really go out and celebrate and have a few beers for the rest of the country. Get on the beers. James, any more patronising advice for us in Sydney before you? Go about your unlocked down day.

Yeah, well, look, you know, you guys will get through it. I think, you know, just keep busy, you know, find a good Netflix show and, you know, to remember it. It does get worse from here. All right, James, well, enjoy the taste of freedom. Thank you for joining us. Thanks so much, guys. Love it to chat. See later.

Thanks, James. Today's episode of The Chaser Report is brought to you by Windows 11. Now with a built-in antivirus to help keep everyone from Bondi away. Tonight, Inner City, Sydney marks a week of lockdown. Nina Ayama has been suffering through it all. And judging by her social media output, some interesting things have been going on during the past week. Hello, Nina.

Hello, how's it going? Well, I haven't yet gotten into open warfare with my toddler, but I'm getting close. How are you coping with this whole self-isolating time-alone thing? Oh, I'm good. I feel like I just got over a hangover that I started at the beginning of lockdown. Wow. So finally come out the other side, yeah.

So how do you time that? As we hit lockdown, did you just start drinking? Or were you already well on the way before? No, well, look, so I've been working quite a lot, not to brag or anything. But I was, like, working nonstop. And because I wanted to, you know, work and be on my best behaviour, I, like, didn't drink. I didn't do any other substances. I was like, I'm just going to have a clean brain.

You know, I'm just going to be like high functioning, like a smart robot that's uninhibited by any substances. But then my Australia Talks Contract like I finished, and then lockdown happened. And I was like, you know what, now's the time. Now's the time I can just, you know, dirty up my clean brain. So the last time we talked to you, Nina, you'd been on an epic Hunterst-Thompsonist voyage to Perth.

we heard a lot about the snacks and the other things continued along the way and I'm not even sure whether you made it to Perth how's the inner journey going at this point so at this point basically like the day of lockdown when my riders moon finished at 10 a.m. I drank a whole bottle of wine in 20 minutes like just a whole bottle of white wine without eating anything

and I remember the first 10 minutes of this and then I don't remember anything Wow, it's like you're at schoolies. Yeah, yeah, it literally was, I did schoolies alone in my room. I was Skyping my friend who was also in the writer's room. And I completely blacked out. And then about three hours later, I came to, and I was lying under my clothesline, vomiting into a bucket that was held by my housemate.

Wow. Wow, okay. This is the, this is the work of an artist right here. This is how an artist gets to the point where they can be in so many writers' rooms and have to cut loose every day and then. This is good stuff, Neen, I so enjoy your comedy. And one of the things I most enjoy about it is the way that you just brilliantly straddle the line of hilariously funny and yet really quite worried about you.

No, I'm fine. But the other thing is, it was just one day of, I just went too hard too soon. But like after that was just like, it was a week of being hung over. Yeah, of course. Do you think it was your body's rejection of your stint at wellness? Do you think your body was like, no, you need to keep a certain level of alcohol and drugs in your system for, so you can operate at an average kind of mode. The moment you go cold turkey, we're just going to reject it.

Anytime new stuff comes into your body. No, I think it's the opposite. I think my body's become a nerd, much to my secret. I was really, I'm so cool. And I'm like, now my body just doesn't, like I've tried to feed it chocolate. It doesn't want it. It's crazy. No, I wish.

I have been eating it for chocolate. That bit's a lie, but the apple bit. Nina, are you going through early onset 30s? No. I'm so far away. I'm still 27, guys. I'm still young. I'm still kid. I'm on TikTok, man. I'm getting sick. No, I don't know. I probably am. You know, there's that, like, rapid detox treatment for heroin where they give you a pill that means that heroin can't touch you, can't do anything. Yeah. Have you found, like, an alcohol version of that or a lifestyle version of that? No, but I shouldn't be given an alcohol version of that because if I do, I would just drink every day and party all the time. because I just think it affected me so much.

So I woke up and I was vomiting into a bucket and then I kind of fell back to sleep and then I woke up and I was in my bed. I was like tucked in. And as soon as I woke up, I was still really drunk and I actually made a group chat with all of the American riders and I called them all in cell.

Nina, I think this is great. This is like a whole movement of young people who are throwing wellness out the window and really rejecting, really rejecting the internet. Instagram kind of wellness stuff. And I think there's an option, this should be like an opportunity here for a whole Netflix series of how you should just go about trashing your body.

I think there's something in this. Yeah, unwellness, I believe. Unwellness. Unwellness. Yeah. Yep. Again, straddling that line where I'm always about to give people the details of how to contact lifeline.

No, it's fine. So, Nina, is this a good time to wish you this happy second day of dry July? Yes, it definitely is. Look, to be honest, I cannot speak of what I will do after this call. Maybe I will break my dry July. Well, as Tony Abbott once said, good governance starts today. So, you know, you can pick any day to start good governance. It's totally up to you.

You can say dry July starts today and it could be in the middle of September. It's totally fine. Yeah. It's dry July anywhere. Thanks, Nina. Stay well. You know, you know, in this time of COVID, we've always said, you know, look after yourself. Stay well.

This time I really mean that's. Today's episode of The Chaser Report is brought to you by Windows 11. Our text-to-speech feature is now almost perfect. Now, Dan, just before we go, you sent me a most interesting little titbit from New Zealand. Yeah, at the moment, New Zealand are passing a whole bunch of hate speech laws, and Judith Collins, who's an MP in New Zealand, who's in the opposition, basically said she's really concerned that the hate speech laws will apply to anyone calling somebody else a Karen. And thankfully, Jacinda Ardern, Prime Minister of New Zealand.

Zealand had this to say in response. Mr. Speaker, I also disagree with that statement and I also, as it happens, disagree with the member statement on Twitter that somehow it will become illegal to call someone a Karen. That is absolutely incorrect and I apologise

that means these laws will not protect that member from such a claim. Just a beautiful slap down from Jacinda Arden. Oh gosh. She's pretty good at a job, isn't she? I wonder what that's like in a prime minister. Can I encourage you to rewind to the start of this podcast and listen to your own advice on that?

Thanks very much, Dan. There's more news available around the clock at chaser.com. You can also follow us on Facebook. You can go on TikTok, Instagram and Twitter. And there's some sort of discord thing that the kids are into. I don't know what it is, but you can ask one of the interns. I'm in the Chaser Discord. It's great fun.

Good way to kill time during lockdown. Oh, and don't forget to subscribe to Dan's podcast. A irrational fear. And I should mention we have a show at the Melbourne podcast festival on Sunday the 1st of August book now. I mean, everything's uncertain in this day and age, but you know what? They'll refund it if it doesn't go ahead. And if it does, it's going to be awesome. And I might as well say, we've got a rational fear playing at the Comedy Republic replay festival in Melbourne on August 14 with some of your favorites from The Chaser, including Sammy Shah and Patricia Carvelis is also joining us on stage too.

There you go. Lots of future events in Melbourne that almost certainly won't be cancelled, we hope. Gary is thanks to rode microphones and we're part of the Acast Creator Network. See you later. See you next time.