This is London Calling, London Calling. Welcome, good afternoon to everyone.
Not so good for me, but good for for Carlos. Um. I
have to start obviously with praises to to Carlos and to his team. Amazing.
What a quality in the end of the match too, when you had
to serve it out you you came up with some big serves and big place
or you deserve it. Absolutely congratulation, amazing, amazing, Welcome to London
calling with me James Danning Poe and my very good friend mister Taby Young.
Now terms, as you can probably see in the background, UM, I
am on holiday in on Oleg Deripaska's yacht. Um. We're touring the Baltic
with with luminous that I can't name, and it's just amazing. You know,
we'll have kind of prostitutes flown in from from Moscow's Boris Johnson there.
I you might think that I couldn't possibly say I'm not telling you whether George
Osborne's here either, because that would be giving the game away. Um.
And as for but mind you, I will treated to one thing. You
should see Klaus Shrub's outfit. He's wearing that that transparent you know that his
beach wear. Um, it's it's something to be, something to behold.
How about you? I can see I can see from the background from your
room. Are you still in Nibitha? No, I'm not. I'm I'm
I've I've I came back to London and now I've flown back out to the
Blairic Islands, this time accompanied by my family, and I'm in ma Yorker.
Can I ask you something? A friend of my daughters has gone out
to ma Yorker recently, and whether you whether you've gone to the same party.
She went with her mother to what she assumed was what they were told
was going to be a big fireworks party, and instead people were wearing horns
and sort of masks and things and prances. It was an eyes wide shut
party. It was. It was. It was in the streets and she's
that They said, you know, what are the fireworks? Fireworks? Later
the woman said, what's this about? We killed God, That's what she
said. We killed God. So so she she in the height of the
tourist season somewhere in New Yorker and nowhere is holding this satanic festival here?
James, Yeah, that's why I've flown out for that. Yeah, you
don't surprise me. Um, yeah, I'll tell you a few travel horror
stories. So um, I don't think I told you this last week,
but or maybe I did and I'd forgotten, but now tell me on our
way to a beat. So I was in a pub in Highgate because a
friend of mine all organized an impromptu fortieth anniversary yet reunion for the class of
eighty three at William Mellot's school I went to in North London Schools. School
never organized as anything even approaching a reunion, so we decided to organize one
ourselves. And so I was in the middle of this pub. All these
people I hadn't seen for like forty years were kind of showing up, and
I discovered that British Airways had canceled my flight to a Bitha the following morning.
Well, I went to check in, you know, before everyone,
or I'd got there about ten minutes early, and decided I'd use that time
to check in on the British Airways app because it was less than twelve hours
before the flight, less than twenty four hours before the flight, and I
couldn't check in. Now that that wasn't a definitive sign that something had gone
awry, because the British Airways app barely worked at the best of times anyway,
So I went on the British Airways website and discovered that the flight had
been canceled no notification from BA, possibly because I booked it through Air Iberia,
don't ask anyway. So then I then had to embark on this mad
dash while surrounded by people I hadn't seen for forty years wanting to talk to
me, to try and get another two tickets the following day out to a
bether and of course I was competing with all the people that have been binned
off this flight that had just been canceled, so it was like, you
know, it was really hard. Anyway, we managed to get a flight
out of East Midland's airport the following day, which was no picnic because you
know, intermittent train strikes getting there would have been great for me, great
for you. Yeah, and actually East Midlands Airport is quite a nice airport,
turns out, but we managed to We managed to get out there,
and but Caroline called Air Iberia and asked for a refund for the outbound canceled
flight, which proved suspiciously easy to get, you know, only she was
only on hold for like fifteen minutes, maybe twenty, and it was surprisingly
frictionless for a kind of you know, travel emergency in this daurn age.
But we discovered actually we were right to be suspicious because when we were then
returning from a Betha we had to quete. We again couldn't check in using
the BA app not a definitive sign barely works, so we had to queue
for an hour to check in to the British Airways flight at a Betha airport.
By the time we get to the head of the queue, talk to
the checking plot, Oh, no, your tickets on this flight have been
canceled. You should have been fully refunded. And it turned out that Air
Iberia had canceled both legs of the flight outbound and inbound, so we couldn't
get on the British Airways flight, and we couldn't buy a ticket on that
flight because it was about to close because we've been queuing for an hour to
check in. Yeah, so we then had we had to Then it was
like again kind of mad scramble. All these people that have been you know,
bend off oversold flights. It was like trying to get everyone trying to
get out of a beef. Everyone really hung over, all partied out,
need to get back to London, and really hard to get a flight which
didn't have a layover in Munich, you know, or Madrid where you'd have
to spend the night. It was like trying to get the last chopper out
of Saigon, you know. Yeah, And eventually we get the last two
seats on a Ryan Air flight that gets into Standstad at ten pm. Costs
nearly seven hundred pounds, and that was too late to get the connection with
Elizabeth Line from Liverpool Streets. We had to get an uber home from Stanstead.
You know, we're talking approaching a thousand pounds now sort of additional costs.
But I can barely be fagged to actually lodge a compensation claim with Air
Iberia because the number of if you if you, if you, if you
divide the total amount that I'm seeking by the number of hours it'll take to
secure it, I'll end up being paid less than the minimum wage. So
that's not going to be so. But the okay flying out to Mayorka was
not quite so bad because we decided to go the cheapest possible option and just
fly out from Stanstead on Ryan Air to Palmer. And it turns out you
won't believe this, James, I didn't believe It's like I checked it.
But actually Ryan Air is now twelve times more reliable than British Airways. So
in twenty twenty two, British Airways canceled three point five percent of flights I
think out of the UK, whereas Ryan Air canceled just zero point three percent.
I mean, it's come to something when the national carrier is twelve times
less reliable than Ryan Bloody Air. Anyway, so the flight out of Stanstead
to Palma wasn't canceled. But when we got off the flight and arrived at
kind of border control in Mayorka, my eighteen year old son discovered that he
didn't have his passport and he immediately tried to blame me. So I gave
it to you, Dad, I'd give it to you to look after it,
which of course they always do, they always always do. Yeah,
And it turned out it had fallen out of his one of his capacious tracky
bottom pockets on the plane, and so we kind of we sort of in
a panic, try to kind of retrace our footsteps, kind of fighting against
the tide of disembarking passengers eventually could go no further. Official kind of blocked
us. Where are you going? He can't get back on the flight.
You know, it's about to be boarded by passengers going back to London.
It was my son's lost his passport. He must have left it on the
plane to anyone handing anything in and eventually we and you know, then we
have a kind of agonizing weight and my son's thinking, oh no, I'm
going to have to go back to London. I have to be on my
own for ten days. And I'm thinking we'd be lucky if you get back
in the house you arrive at you know, UK border control. Without a
passport, you might end up in a detention center and you know, hazes
or harms Harmon's work, and that'll learn him look gartas possible after that.
But anyway, then a flight attendant appeared kind of waiving the passport, smiling
at us, and turned out they'd actually found it. They had been handed
in by It was that the Christians. What No, it wasn't the Christian
sun, No, it wasn't. It was the older one. Anyway.
So so that was the only that's the only disaster that's befallen us so far.
But having said that, there is an orange alert for Wednesday, which
is, you know, a severe heat warning. So that's when the temperature
is expected to be between forty and forty five degrees centigrade. Ye, so
that of course my kids just want to head straight for the beach and just
going to fry um and I'm honor them to put on the sun cream and
stay on the shade. It's the usual family dynamics. I'm feeling your your
your relaxation, and it looks looks a really nice villea you've got that it
actually the villa is really nice. Yeah. How do you do you get
free bits? Do you do? Do you get travel articles or do you
get some off airbnb or what? No, we got it off Airbnb?
Um but um, and no it's not free. I wish it was.
No. Money is just being hoovered out of my pockets since I arrived,
and I'm going to be completely fleeced by the time I get back on the
plane to return to London. Why did you choose me, Yoka? Well,
we kind of we had a we stupidly, my wife and I asked
our children where they'd like to go. So that just got four kids,
all teenagers. They just kind of couldn't agree endless, you know, dinner
time arguments. My my my Christian son formerly Christian son, Freddie he wanted
to go to Japan. My daughter Sasha that, yeah, how it has
already cost us? End How many of you are the seven of you to
Japan? Six of us? Yeah, yeah, very extend that would work.
At one point, we're looking at Kenya and my friend Aiden, who
spent most of the time in Kenya, he did he did find as someone
renting a house in on the kind of on the coast um near Lamo,
but anyway, Lama near Niar Mombassa. And but the flights a loan were
a thousand pounds each um, so that wasn't really that yeah. And also
then you get you get kidnapped by um Somali pirates and health hostage fruit mind
you save on the on the bills at home, wouldn't it if you being
kept in a in a in a hut and fed on goat for a year?
But that's true? Do you think they yeah, I mean, do
you think when they when they ask for the ransom. They also kind of
factor in kind of you know, accommodation lodging, Bordon lodging. Yeah,
I would, I would hope. So if they're canny, as I imagine
Somali pirates are, and also if you're reaching goat, you're going full carnival,
aren't you. I mean, you're not going to get any that's true.
Might be tough on my my wife and daughter, both of them,
the vegetarians. I think that force measure, that's the phrase I'm looking for,
might might alter that. Yeah, obviously I'm still preoccupied as dark we'll
just talk about at the moment. Can I just say though, that all
the things that you think in your anecdote there you think of as this kind
of random things that have happened to you this summer, it's all deliberate.
It's all that the war on travel is not accidental. And it may seem
old that British Airways is conspiring it in its own demise, but I think,
but I believe it probably is. I believe all the airlines are ultimately
in on this because they've had they've been given the nod from upstairs. Air
Travel is toasts, and we want it as a preliminary to stopping us,
you know, locking us up in our fifteen minutes. It is what they
want to do, is so in the idea in our heads that the idea
we don't even want to travel because the experience is so grueling and unpleasant and
random as to whether we get our flights allowed or not. That we same
with your heat wave, by the way, I mean, do you not
remember the time when one used to go to the Mediterranean in the summer and
fully expect it to be it won't pray indeed that it would be forty five
degrees? Is in foreign in foreign language, or about you know, in
the nineties in in English because that's what in old money, because that's what
you want, you don't and you don't characterize it as a kind of climate
emergency. I mean, have you seen how on the weather forecast now they
always show the weather with these red in the background, you know, indicative
of danger and man's selfishness and greed and all the other. I know that
the weather map on the BBC is practically in flames, isn't it these days?
It is so differently orange? Yeah, yeah, amazingly up until up
until this this decade, people went to the Mediterranean on holiday every summer and
did not die. So yeah, yeah, I mean, I don't think
the trouble, I mean it weren't surprised to learn. I think the trouble
chaos is cock up, not conspiracy. I don't think that Klaushfab was responsible
for my son forgetting his passport on the plane. But um, I think
that they certainly, certainly efforts are underfoot to make travel more difficult as part
of some you know, climate change agenda. There's no question about that,
and they are certainly exaggerating the risks posed to asked by elevated temperatures. I
mean, you know, in the state of Texas, I think it's it's
over forty degrees centigrade, you know, for most of the summer, and
people still manage to function, you know, tourists still come to Texas,
people don't spontaneously combust in the street because the thermometers climbed above forty degrees.
So I agree, it's it does seem to be kind of the exaggeration of
the risks associated with severe temperatures, does seem to be part of a kind
of net zero agenda, which you've kind of and seated my point without admitting
it or conceding it, because you are kind of admitting that there are forces
in the world which are determined to in the name Yeah, I mean I
agree with you, by the way, in the name in the name of
the false god climate change. They are trying to stop us traveling. So
it's only it's only a question of degree that. Yeah. But I don't
think British Airways needs any prompting, um to you know, to cock up
its schedule and cancel flights. It just needs to be general incompetence. And
I think it's partly because um, it's partly because you know, they can't
get the staff. Um. And they can't get the staff because lots of
people have decided to retire because the government paid them to work from home during
the lockdown. They don't want to go back to work, and it takes
a while to train flight attendants, let alone pilots. So um, you
know, I think I think, I think, let's not forget that the
Jamed pilots who are dying. Yeah, that's the other problem. Were you
disappointed to see no Vacs Djokovic lose in the final of Wimbledon's I was,
I was rooting for the older man and for the unjabbed person in fact,
in fact, during during the match, just to go the rest of the
family who are not let's say as um as um fanatical about anti anti anti
vacs as I am. Um. My son googled to see whether what's he
called Alcarez acna Traz we call him, Yeah, he has got a bit
of here, Acnatraz that he googled to see what acne trass position on the
vaccines were and low age seventeen. He said, I think we should get
the vaccines for all, for the good of all, or something something like
that, and everyone's safe. So I thought, I want Acnatraz to lose
this one. Even though he plays, he plays some lovely shots. I
mean, his winning shots are something else, aren't they? He pulls them
out of the hat. Yeah, I watched a bit of a bit.
It was he's pretty impressive for, you know, someone who's just turned twenty.
I mean, my wife was absolutely rooting for him, not because she's
not because she's not because she's a vaccine so I think she just felt,
I mean, she doesn't have much sympathy for Novak. And you know,
notwithstanding his principled stance on refusing to get vaccinated, he's not a terribly sympathetic
characteristic. He's got a little bit of negative. Oh hang on, did
you hear his his speech? His speech was very gracious. Oh god,
it was lovely. It completely belied his reputation as this as this kind of
stolid, unemotional um, just a machine. It was a beautiful speech,
a lot better, a lot better than actress. I mean that's English.
Well yeah, yeah, Alcarez only congratulated Novak as an afterthought, as though
someone in his box had kind of said, you haven't congratulated no bread yet.
Come on, Yeah he wasn't. Yeah, it was a very gracious
speech, but it seemed, yeah, it was. It was slightly unexpected
because out of character. And he did smash his racket sort of like literally
fifteen minutes beforehandy. But then he gave his smash its true man in yellow
in the crowd. So he apparently. I like Djokovic. I think he's
I think he's good obviously. Um yeah, his position on the on the
death jabs has been I mean I talked to um. I mean it's hard
to remember now because we've all memory holded just how much pressure sporting stars were
under to take these bloody death jebs they were, and Pat Cash was was
helping to sort of fight this rearguard action, sort of spreading the word quietly
through the back door, trying to get as many tennis players as possible saved
from the death. Jeb I think, um, how do you how do
you say Medvedet? Is it Medvedev? Was it me? Or I'm not
sure your sound? I wish I could. I want to learn Russian.
Maybe some some volunteer can come along and teach me how to speak Russian.
I'd love to be able to pronounce the name. So I don't. I
don't call Levin Levin. I called him Leevin Um. But Medvedev Medvedev hasn't
had a jab, so I was kind of rooting for him against the American
kid who I mean basically, I'll always root for the older player against the
youngsters because I don't like young upstarts that mean sold them. You know,
they've got youth on their side. They don't need victory as well. Yeah,
um, so we should, we should, we should break for a
programmatic ab James, Yeah, and then come back and talk about your the
loss you've suffered in the previous week. Yeah, everybody, James Lilac,
you're for the Ricochet podcast, the Flagship Podcast. It's July. That means
it's hard. What better to do than sit inside with the air conditioning going
four blast while they listened to the heated, sparkly brickly fireworks opinions of Peter
Robinson, rob Long and myself as we talked to Well, you'll just have
to tune in and find out, won't you. That's ricochet dot com where
the Flagship Podcast can be found every week. Don't miss it. So I'll
tell you what terms whatever that programmatic ad was, I'll bet you it's going
to be inimical and antithetical to all the things that we try to represent on
this podcast. So it'll be it would have been pushing climate change, offset
carbon off sets, wind turbine credits. Yeah, no, it would have
been visor because until everyone's safe, nobody's safe. Yeah yeah yeah, Nasaton
de belably your local farmacists, Yeah yeah, yeah yeah, and yeah um
well um yes i am. I'm I'm more upset than I should be.
Um or perhaps now I'm as upshit set as I should be that, as
you know, because I think we hinted it last week, but I think
the full impact hadn't hit home. I've had my Twitter account with one hundred
and twelve thousand followers hat and stolen by this company promoting some kind of shitcoin,
some kind of cryptocurrency, and Twitter, which you'd think would be lightly
interested in stopping people's I mean, theft, That's what it is, isn't
it. It's theft because I'm sure an account with one hundred and twelve thousand
followers has has great monetary value inasmuch as you can use I mean I used
it to promote my podcasts and stuff like this and you know this this podcast
included, and to have chat and stuff. And presumably there are people on
Twitter who are there for people like me because they don't on just the boring
commentary from um you know, Alistair Campbell and Gary Linka being put out by
their bots. They actually want real people saying real things. And because I
think I think the one thing Twitch has got over the over the possibly um
better run sites or more honest sites like getter and gabs, that it's got
diversity hasn't it, it's got diversity of opinion, and I think it's more
fun to be on because there's more of a cut and thrust and if if
you get rid of the people like me, you're just essentially killing what makes
Twitter interesting. But it seems that Elon Musk and Twitter support that I mean,
it's not that. I mean I keep making appeals, but a to
try and get get through the Twitter's appeal system is a bit like you trying
to get your money back for your flights or to try to rebook a flight
with with with Ryan Air, when when everyone else from BA is trying to
get one too. Um that there are plenty of opportunities to complain if you've
been misgendered or if I don't know, you've been hurt by somebody's hurting words,
but you try complaining that your site, your your Twitter profile with one
hundred and twenty one hundred and twelve thousand followers has been stolen and is being
used by a cryptocount. You just stolen in plain site and everyone can see
it. I mean, it's it's not like it's hard to prove, and
Twitter support is not interested. I've I've I've appealed three times, and every
time I've checked on on my case with my case number, it says your
case has been closed. And I think we'll hang on a second. When
did you when was it open? When did you do anything about what evidence
you look at before you close my case? So I'm I suppose what I'm
doing here is appealing, apart from anything else, to all my old followers.
Have you got the name of my my temporary Twitter account? I think
it's at James Delling, isn't it. Yeah, yeah, I'm following you.
But if if, if, if you could use your your two hundred
thousand followers and an appeal to like minded people to kind of spam. Elon
Musk was saying, like, can you reinstate James Dannypole's stolen account? I'd
appreciate it because it's it's horrible. I mean, if I leave Twitter,
I'd like to leave of my own accord because I'm the sick of it,
rather than because some criminal enterprise has stolen my account and Twitter does nothing about
it. When I when when I first heard reports James that you were claiming
your Twitter account had been hacked, I thought, oh my god, what
has he said? Like I thought you'd said something so unspeakable on Twitter that
you you'd panicked and said, all right, cat was hacked, wasn't me?
My cat was hacked? And people the standard default position, if you're
threatened with cancelation for saying something politically incorrect on Twitter, you immediately go to
my account was hacked. But but I couldn't think of anything. You know,
you could say that you know you haven't said already, and that would
likely get you canceled when you know, I mean, it was just hard
to imagine something that you even you considered beyond the pale, whereby you'd have
to kind of invent the fact that your account had been happy. I can't
imagine that thing would be No, I can't imagine what d so anyway,
I looked at your account and clearly has been hacked. Um, yeah it
was. Did you hear what happened to Patrick Christie's at GB News? GB
News presenter Patrick Christie's married to engage your many carvar so he after just stopped
oil protested George Osbourne's wedding. Um, it was quite a mild predatim he
saw it, but confetti was thrown at the happy couple. It turned out
the the the confetti thrower, that just Stop oil protester. The Daily Mail
dug into her and turned out she she just got back from a holiday in
Thailand. Couldn't make it up anyway. So Patrick Christie's said on Twitter,
if a just Stop oil protester turned up at my wedding, there end up
in the graveyard behind the church. And this was taken and this prompted various
complaints by all the gb News haters to Twitter, and he was notified that
his account had been closed because he breached Twitter's rules about not threatening people with
violence or not using violent language. It was obviously a joke, he didn't
mean it literally. It wasn't actually going to murder adjust a boil protester if
they turned up to protest his wedding, And so the Free Speech Union he
reached out to us for help and we helped him compose an appeal and his
account was reinstated. I think also gb News corporate got in touch with Twitter,
you know, corporate, to complain about it. But anyway, his
account was reinstated within twenty four hours. So when you appealed, did you
I think there is a kind of button you can push if you're you can
you can you can tick a box which if your account has been hacked,
So it hacked account division of Twitter Support. You did all that, did
you? Yes? I did, although I have to say i've did.
Yeah, I went through that today. I mean, um, my previous
complaints were to Twitter Support different I don't know terps. I'm not very good
at tech. Um, but yeah I have. I have gone through that
hacked thing. Um. So okay, is there there is there a special
fast tracking thing that one can get to if one's if one's a big hitter
with with like lots of followers, you think you think they care a bit
more? Just did not not be purchased a blue Now I didn't know?
Okay, I agree that would have been I think, I mean, I
think I don't know, you know if if if any, I mean,
I don't know how many people are left in Twitter Support these days. It's
probably you know, two men and two men and a dog, um somewhere
in you know, California, but um or possibly Bangalore. But but but
if you kind of I think it's probably worth saying that. You know,
you're you're, you're, you're, you had over one hundred thousand followers that
you clearly that you're you're, you know, an award winning journalist. You've
been a journalist for forty years. You're still right for the spectator, you
know, try and make yourself sound super respective, the kind of person.
Yeah, that's going to work. I'll see you through that one. I
didn't tell you. I didn't tell you the other thing. Um, in
my desperation when I was when I I had a Twitter account with like four
with four followers, you know, a temporary account, and one of my
one of my team, one of my my production team, UM, very
sweetly said, UM. On that kind of work work chat on on WhatsApp.
He said, lots of people are saying you should try this. This
this Russian hacker guy who specializes in getting your your account back. I thought,
And he said, lots of people have been saying this, and I
hadn't. I hadn't got my on Twitter at this point, or I'd only
got four four of sight, so I hadn't got I wasn't in a position
to check so right, So I looked at his screen shot and I took
that noted the name of this Russian hacker person who who's apparently a white hat
who rescues your accounts. And I contacted him and I explained the situation,
and he's very eager and friendly and and he says, um ah, yes,
I can help. But but well, I thought he's Russian. I
mean, he's Russian. He's got to be good because he's gonna. He's
gonna. I mean, that's his job is. And he's a hacker.
I mean they're they're hackers by nature. So he does this for fun,
but for the ships and giggles, and then he says he mentions that he
needs seventy five pounds for this special bit of software. And I'm thinking,
sorry, seventy five dollars, and I'm thinking, well, that's sixty quid
in real money. And actually I would pay sixty quid even if he is
a fraud. It's worth it for the anecdote. Yeah, I've so,
So I start going through this process and I pay him um and um.
Then he tries to I paid to this one account and and and he says
it's being delayed. So so he gives me. He gives me a refund,
and I can see I've got my refund clearly from him. They say,
try this account so I send him mine to that account and he says,
no, this one doesn't work either. I'll send you a refund.
Can you try this account? And I say, yeah, sure, i'll
send I'll send more money to the next account, but not until I've got
the refund from this account. And he says, but I have sent you
refund. You trust me. I send it back before, And I said,
yeah, you sent it back last time, but you didn't send it
back this time. And until I get receipt of funds, I cannot send
you anymore because I was thinking, yeah, sixty quid, I can lose
one hundred and twenty. No, that's not worth the anecdote anyway. Of
course, it turns out that he is a hacker because when I refuse to
pay this extra money, he starts getting very angry with me and starts making
threats and stuff. And he said, you realize I am a hacker.
And I'm thinking, if you were a hacker, actually you wouldn't be.
You wouldn't be making threats like I am a hacker. Don't you know who
I am? I'm a hacker. You basically you're a scamster. So what
I would say is if if somebody advises you you can get your Twitter account
back by with this Russian hacker. Don't. Don't go for it, because
it's because unfortunately my my extreme desire to get my Twitter account back overcame the
voice in my head that says, hang on a second, are you sure
you want to be paying money to this guy who claims to be a Russian
hacker? Yeah? Yeah, well that sounds yeah, it sounds like you
were wise not to send the Oh but while we're here, given I haven't
got a Twitter account, I just like to advertise is my coming my next
delling pod speaker event with Live Dealing Pod Live with Clive to Carl, which
is quite coming up quite shortly. Um endorse it in doorset Um, sorry
shit shit um Dorset accent um Endorset on the twenty eighth of July. Um,
it's going to be great. Obviously I did my live events always are.
Did you do Nick Dixon's other podcast last week? I did? How
was that? Oh? It was great? Um? And I think he
thought that I was being you know, like, I'm James Delingport, I'm
so grand. I don't do podcasts with little people. Um. And actually
the reason that I was being so hard to get was just like, I'm
really I'm really flaky and disorganized, and I don't like committing to anything I
don't like. I don't like committing to events more than two weeks in the
future, which makes my which makes my Dary a real problem because I know
that sensible people plan way in advance. I hate planning an advance. I
don't know why it's it's you know, maybe I was attacked by Dary in
my youth and I never forgave it or something. I don't know. That's
interesting because it's almost like a kind of, you know, a crossover event
in which, you know, Spider Man appears in the MCU because I do
a podcast with Nick Dickson every week called The Weekly Skeptic, and now you've
appeared in his other podcast, which is called The Current Thing, and so
that must have been that might be a bit strange for our mutual fans.
Yeah, well, well here's the thing. So it turns out he told
me I don't whether this is true. Maybe you can confirm now, you
know, how you keep trying to your best argument against my conspiracy theories is
that you believe in Paul is Dead theory and you don't believe in dinosaurs,
therefore all your conspiracies aren't real. I mean, that's that's roughly your line.
And he played that I don't believe in the Paul is Dead conspiracy theory.
No, you don't believe. But and you think you believe in dinosaurs
as well. I do, yeah, yeah, And you are constantly throwing
out in my face that you don't believe in dinosaurs, James, and you
think that Paul is dead. Therefore all your conspiracies all belong to us,
you know that they're all rubbish. And he tells me that he invented this
particular line of attack. This is his obsession which he fed to you.
Ah, I think his his his his line, his his line, I
think wasn't quite that, but I think his his line was that it's slightly
odd that you would be so intelligently skeptical about various claims made by authorities such
as, you know, unless we reduce carbon emissions to net zero by twenty
fifty, the world's going to explode, but rather credulous when it comes to
conspiracy theories, not applying the same skeptical, analytical forensic approach to an How
do you know as you would. Well, that was his original arguments.
It wasn't quite quite, but that theory if you believe in A and B,
then C cannot possibly be true either. I think I think I probably
did scool him on this. I did go through a fairly lengthy explanation as
to why I cautiously but reasonably confidently I think dinosaurs didn't exist, whereas ain't
dragons did exist but not dinosaurs. I think he's more open. He's probably
more open to being persuaded than I am about same dinosaurs. But perfect But
just on one point. You can't accuse somebody of being credulous if if the
things that things are matters where which I actually turn out to be true.
I mean, you don't know whether Paul is alive or dead. You've you've
seen the kind of the Paul impersonator fall McCartney. But you don't know that
I'm wrong in the same way you don't know I'm wrong about dinosaurs. Is
your assumption based on having not looked into it? But you can't. You
can't accuse me of not having um looks for revidence and stuff and looked into
it, which which I have done. I'm pretty confident that the guy you
see doing all those stumbs up signs on chat shows and stuff is actually a
Paul impersonator, and that dinosaurs were invented in order to as part of the
campaign to persuade us that the Earth is older than it really is. But
that's where we are. What is the evidence that Paul was replaced by a
Yeah, well, I think I don't want to sort of misrepresent that the
complexities of it, but I think that part of the theory is that the
real Paul died in a car crash, he blew his mind out in a
car in nineteen sixty six, and that this this replacement came along. There
may have been more than one replacement UM, and it like all these these
was the was the evidence for that they were? Well, well, I
say the evidence ranges from photographs of the You look at the before and after,
and it does not look like the same person. That's so that's one
of them. I don't I'm not so convinced by that because I think it.
I think it's I've I've I've spoken to female UM skeptics about this,
and they are much more alive too, including some of some of them who
were remember being real fans of of of Paul McCart of the Beatles in the
early days, and then switching because something happened and they couldn't you know that
looking back they realize is that that they they saw that he wasn't the same
person. So what I'm saying is that maybe maybe women, in the same
way that men can't tell whether they're wives about a haircut, we're not very
good at good at physical observations and say where women can spot it. Maybe
that's more of a female friendly conspiracy. But there are others, other bits
and pieces which I can't remember. Monarchaus. The problem with each, with
each of the individual conspiracy theories is that you need to be on top of
it. Listen, we should probably break for one more program that we should
add, and then get a culture corner. This is Stephen Hayward of the
power Line Blog and the power Lines Show on Ricochet, inviting you to tune
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So, James, I, because I'm on HO day, I did
manage to find some time to do a bit of TV watching, and I
managed to finish The Tulsa King, which which I thought was really pretty good.
I remember you initially recommending don't like the premise, Okay, I don't.
I don't like the idea of if Tulsa is a place of God,
guns and horses, like three of my favorite things. Why do I want
to Mai matthios see matthis Matthioso going into this town and ruining it and corrupting
it. I want Tulsa as it as it is. I see. Yeah.
Um, well, notwithstanding you know that objection, I thought it was
reasonably well done. I mean, tap tap is it the guy who the
guy who wrote it and produced it, who also does Yo Stone. He's
Taylor Sheridan. He's he's he's a talent. He's a great filmmaker and a
great television maker too. And I've also downloaded season two of yellow Stone so
I can watch that while I'm here. But yeah, I thought, I
thought, I mean, it's still it's quite in some ways quite hard to
buy Stallone as a kind of you know, to Familiars as a kind of
charismatic kind of gangster who manages to kind of assemble this crew from scratch to
take on the kind of the home crew in New York when he's seventy eight
and he's been banged up for twenty five years, and you know, doesn't
that's what happens? Well, oh, no, spoilers. Have you not
watch the spor haven't you? You spoke the entire Actually you actually made me
want to come back now because they were they were very nasty is New York
Controllers? Yeah, so what I thought I thought it was. I thought
it was pretty well done, pretty entertaining, And in the end I quite
like Stallan and sort of believed in him as that character so much better than
schwartz Effort, He's horrible in Foo Bar. Yeah, yeah, okay,
I might I might on that recommend now I know where the plot goes,
I might come back to it. So he recruits So you're saying he recruits
a team in Tulsa. Yeah, of all places and I'm buying that.
Yeah, okay, I'm looking. I hope there's going to be another season.
I haven't actually checked, but if there is, I'll be there.
So, um, have you've seen anything in the past week? Well,
yes, um, I saw a terrible thing on Netflix, absolutely awful,
awful, awful Eldorado, which was a documentary about the supposedly true story of
the of the Berlin nightclub scene that gave us Babylon Berlin. You know.
So the thesis was Weimar Republic was paradise and it was especially a paradise for
for LGBT Plus and if you don't support every aspect of the LGBT plus agenda,
you are a Nazi. So I'm not going to waste time on that
because it's so awful. So I then fled to a place I never go
to normally, which is BBC BBC three and watch this reality series which is
kind of appalling but kind of addictive, called The Traitors. Do you know,
but have you seen The Traders? It's okay, So it's made in
Australia and it's a bunch of about twenty five contestants go to a nice country
hotel in Australia, and four of them are secretly chosen to be traitors,
and the traitors meet every evening in secret to discuss which contestant is going to
be bumped off next, and when they can churn up to breakfast, one
is missing because they've been killed by the traitors. And then and there are
various pointless game show elements, and there's a there's a visibly small prize which
we're encouraged to be excited about, but it's not really And the um,
the the faithfuls, as the non traitors are known. Every every evening everyone
gathers traitors and faithfuls alike to eliminate one contestant UM and they keep hoping they're
going to eliminate a traitor and so so so they have a roundtable discussion of
the clues that might have been that you know, the traitors might have given
them, and and every time they end up um binning one of their own
because they're because they're deceived by the traitors. So it's an incredibly it's characteristic
of the way that popular entertainment is designed to subvert our culture and make us
weaker. And you know, so so here is a here is a series
designed to encourage lying, deception, to promote conspiracy, to um you know,
to promote division, and we're encouraged to root for the baddies in a
way, because it's extraordinary how weak and gullible and distracted the faithful are that
they keep sort of having these hunches which proved to be to be completely false.
And you think, if this is if these people were on a jury
and you were innocent, God help you, because they'd be inventing all these
sort of reasons about why why you done it, and there you'd be sitting
in the door, actually completely innocent. But it's quite entertaining, sounds quite
good. So I'm still on Framley Parsonage. I think the fourth in the
BArch To Chronicles, which I'm enjoying. Someone said that they had listened to
the Palace and novels, but narrated by somebody else who they thought was quite
good. The first one is not done by is not done by um By.
Yeah, this wasn't, But this wasn't just the first one. This
was an entirely different narrator called Shaw Parker, and he takes a lot longer
than Timothy West. So this was this is the Duke's Children. That's not
the first one, is it? No? Nice, So I think that's
I think that's the last one. Um so maybe the last. I mean
I haven't actually listened to the last one yet, so maybe it's the Just
as the first one, as you say, wasn't read by Timothy West,
maybe the last one wasn't either. But it sounds like it's just a completely
different version read by a different voice actor, who my friend says is quite
good. It was certainly good on the first one. I'm not dissing him.
I just think Timothy West is so good, so good with it it
Shaw Parker on the first one, man, I think it may have been.
I think it may have been. But the thing about Timothy West,
unlike almost every other voiceover artist I've come across, I've never yet found him
get a word wrong pronounced certain true mainly yeah. I mean, he may
be a lovey, but he's an educated Yeah. Yeah, and that's quite
important when you're reading trollope, I think, because well it is. I
told you. I'm sure I've mentioned this before that when the reader of Memoirs
of the Fox Hunting Man pronounced the pie lee the pitch lee, right,
and I think he want this is a book about pop fox hunting. You
cannot pronounce the name of one of the four Great County hunts um incorrectly.
M h it's it's us anyway. Yeah, well it's my hunt. So
obviously I'm slightly pissed. But yeah, um, I'm I'm still finishing um
shamus a tool or whatever it's called. Yeah, yeahs finn phineas finn um.
Yeah, I still haven't worked how he's gonna he's gonna go back to
the nice Irish girl um that he should marry at the end. I'm sure.
I'm sure Trump is working his way around to it. Yes, yes,
yes, m okay, Well all right, James, I'm gonna leave
you because it's your really children and yeah, I think they want to go
to the beach. So are you there for just before you go? Are
you in a nice part of New York? Or I mean has it all
been ruined like everywhere? Now we're in the north. It's near a town
called Alcudia, Um, Alcudia, and it's actually pretty nice. Um the
north is nicer than the south. But yeah, it's I mean, you
know, you go into town, there are quite a few tourists around,
but it's not kind of, it's not magaalouf. It's pretty nice. And
no no wind turbines, No wind turbines as far as I can see,
no um no. And you know, supermarkets reasonably well stocked um. And
restaurants not you know, wildly of a priced. Went to a nice tapas
spark or but Imperial in Port the Plensa on the first night and go away
under two hundred quid for six of us, which was Now you've mentioned that,
Toby, what's the name again? Bar Imperial? Okay? And what's
what's I have advertised you on my podcast? Can I have a free free
a night? Yeah? I'm going to mention that when I go back there.
Yeah, I definitely want to go back before we leave. Definitely the
best first place we can, so go for it. Um okay, what
hopes? Well? Um? Have um fun? Oh? Yes, you
can get tickets to my climb to carfing at event right, look up Delling
Pod twenty eight July. Indorse it okay, all down right, all right,
James, good to talk to you, okay, and you have fun?
Why this is London falling? Ricochet joined the conversation