London Calling

This week James and Toby discuss if James is suffering from mercury poisoning, whether Tobes is, at the least, partly responsible for PayPal’s recent difficulties, and the ongoing trials and tribulations of the new Prime Minister.

In other news we ask if Michael Gove is a sadist, congratulate John Cleese on his announcement that he’s joining GB News and, of course, ponder Toby's conspicuous absence from Boris’s resignation honours list. Finally, no discussion would be complete without contemplating our complete thermonuclear destruction.

In Culture Corner, we touch on our current obsessions: The Old Man, House of the Dragon and Rings of Power.

Time marches on and so James wishes Toby a happy birthday (today, Oct. 17) but they both worry about the approaching Big Six-O. And while one might assume than a man of Toby's "advanced" years would be through with cycling, he relates to James the tale of his recent accident (which pleases James because he doesn’t like cyclists to begin with).

Speaking of time, when Liz Truss became PM it was heralded as a new age because, for the first time in British history none of the top four cabinet positions were held by white men. That lasted for a whole 38 days as Jeremy Hunt took over as Chancellor on the 14th of October. Is the replacement of Kwasi Kwarteng a deep state coup or just the inevitable consequence of the reaction to the mini-budget by the bond and currency markets?

They also talk about whether the plays of Shakespeare were actually written by the 17th Earl of Oxford (Edward de Vere) and, in Culture Corner, The Way We Live Now, The Rings of Power and The Old Man.

Now that the drama about who is to be the next Prime Minister has been settled, in the most undramatic fashion with an uncontested race for the Tory Leadership, the high drama remains on London Calling... Will Toby capitulate and join Team James in the WEF Globalist Conspiracy wing of the podcast?

Oh, wait. Can we even use the word "globalist?" Or has that been designated as the next anti-Semitic "dog whistle?" We also talk about the idiotic stunts of Extinction Rebellion.

In Clinic Culture Corner, TraumaZone (BBC iPlayer), Adam Curtis' series on the collapse of Soviet Russia, Season 2 of Barbarians (Netflix), and The Bear (Hulu/FX in the US, Disney+ in the UK).

This week Toby Young talks to the man in the street. Our man James Delingpole is literally on the streets of London - complete with the occasional car horn, siren and gusts of wind - but the show must go on.

Toby wraps up his trip with tales of Mexico and then, staying in North America, they take on Justin Trudeau and the Canadian Crackdown. Who is calling the shots? Is it the the PM or Klaus Schwab? Domestically we ask the question, "Is Boris Johnson running the worst government in recent memory?" And then they survey the damage of last week's storm.

In Culture Corner we wrap up Reacher and take on Pam and Tommy (Hulu).

In this week’s episode of London Calling, James and Toby engage in a bit of throat-clearing about James’s meeting with Jason Miller, CEO of Gettr, then get to the main event – Putin’s invasion of Ukraine – which they disagree about. James is sceptical about the fact that so much of the MSM is “hot for war," as he puts it, while Toby argues that the reason there is almost universal condemnation of Putin is because he has engaged in an unprovoked act of military aggression against an independent sovereign state and his forces are currently bombing civilians. James insists it’s “more complicated” than that and believes the political leader of Ukraine, as well as the leaders of the West, bear some responsibility for the crisis.

Then, in Culture Corner, James says how much he’s enjoying jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy (Netflix), while Toby continues to praise Pam and Tommy (Hulu), although he’s not convinced Pam is quite as innocent as she’s portrayed by Lilly James.

The US Navy's recruiting slogan used to be, "It's not just a job, it's an adventure!" Sometimes that applies to this podcast, too.

This week Toby comes to us from Mexico City and James from rural England where broadband is non-existent and hard drives go to die. After taping on Monday, James' computer committed seppuku, leaving us without a show. But we've gotten the band back together and we're here with your weekly fix.

It's a North American sandwich to start off - Toby talks about his trip to Mexico and then the guys launch into the "state of emergency" in Canada. What has happened to the country that produced the Hundred Days campaign, the Raid on Dieppe and the storming of Juno Beach on D-Day?

On the domestic front we talk about Prince Andrew's out-of-court settlement with Virginia Giuffre in the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.

Finally in Culture Corner we all contemplate "The Jack Reacher Diet."

Jump up in the cab, good buddies, look's like we got ourselves a convoy...

James and Toby discuss the Freedom Convoy, which has restored their faith in Canadians and then touch on the Jimmy Carr joke imbroglio. Carr, who has made a living telling tasteless jokes (and avoiding taxes, but that's another story) has caused various left-wing comedians to demand that he and his Netflix special be cancelled.

Before we get to Culture Corner, the reviewers get reviewed! We have the first ever review of London Calling, published in a progressive, online magazine called Left Foot Forward.

Then we talk Reacher (Amazon Prime) and give updates on All of us Are Dead and Ozarks.

The last time we heard from our intrepid duo, Toby and James were making plans to go shooting together. It seems they fought off all temptation to take aim at one another because they're back - hail, hearty and full of game.

There is, of course, the continuing sagas of our times: Partygate, who's really in charge of Covid policy and the inglorious end of the NHS vaccine mandate. In America there's the fall out over The Joe Rogan Experience and whether our little show would fall foul of Spotify’s new Covid rules.

Rogan is just the beginning though, with the attachment of trigger warnings now being placed on Harry Potter, Oliver Twist and even 1984.

In this week's episode of London Calling is very sobering - literally. Before James and Toby talk about who's to blame for the crisis in Ukraine, Toby's Dry January turned very wet over the weekend.

Then they take on Putin, Biden, NATO and Ukraine and why they can't bring themselves to spell Kiev "K-Y-I-V."

On the home front, would Boris be better to cling to nurse for fear of something worse, the late-to-the-party lockdown sceptics and, in Culture Corner, The Undoing (HBO), the Brothers Karimazov and Martin Chuzzlewit.

In this week's London Calling, James and Toby argue about whether the global pandemic is over (Toby thinks it is, while James thinks it's a false dawn) and discuss the Johnny-come-latelies who claim to have been lockdown sceptics all along. They compare them to repentant Communists after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

They also worry that it may be all over for their old friend Boris (well, James isn't that worried) and what is going to offered up to satisfy the Tory base in "Operation Save Big Dog," whether that puts the television license back on the table. And if the BBC is such great value for the money why doesn't it become a subscription service?

In Culture Corner, thumbs up to Yellowjackets (Sky in the UK, Showtime in the US) with reservations and Dopesick(Disney+ in the UK, Hulu in the US), while Toby gives lukewarm reviews to The Duke, Being the Ricardos (Amazon Prime) and Red Rocket.