Trump will be a law unto himself

I SIGNED the parliamentary petition against President Trump’s state visit yesterday.

It took some faffing about because it was a novel experience, not being a dab hand at this online stuff. But I had to do it after the Prime Minister’s official spokesman sneerily dismissed the petition as “a populist gesture”.

Just like Theresa May to look down her nose at ordinary voters like me and my fellow petitioners.

Popular it certainly is. My name was number 1,602,582, and the rollcall was growing at more than two thousand an hour – at six o’clock in the morning.

The government is obliged to respond but snooty Mrs May has already got her retaliation in first, declaring that she’s “very happy” to invite the Great Groper to a banquet with the Queen.

So the visit will go ahead, probably in the autumn. So will the street protests and I will be there, too. So, I bet, will hundreds of thousands of my fellow citizens.

Mrs May has managed to divide the nation with her clod-hopping diplomacy. She has also embarrassed the Queen, putting her in an impossible position. With good fortune, she will regret it.

There’s no fool like a politician who believes her own hype, and Theresa the Appeaser is guilty of monumental self-deception.

She really thinks that “The Donald” listens to what she says and acts on what she tells him. Naive, or what?

Look at his body language: brusque and insensitive. Listen to his words: totally non-committal. Read his face: a mask of condescension.

He is the most powerful man in the world (and don’t forget it). She is the Prime Minister of a middleranking country divorcing itself from its post-war history, its political future and its biggest market.

There is no parity of esteem. The relationship is one-sided, not special. At least, this unsavoury episode has done some good. It has dispelled the phoney euphoria over the great romance between “Donald and My Maggie”.

It’s not even an arranged marriage. It’s a shotgun wedding, and he has the firearm.