Storm Donald blows over ... P
SOON after my LNER train left Kings Cross for Leeds, coach D exploded into cheers. England had scored.
It got less noisy after that, but on the local to Keighley, there were gasps and sighs and cries of “No!” from travellers on their tablets.
This must be the first football World Cup that was watchable, by everybody, everywhere, on all sorts of gizmos.
You couldn’t avoid the event. It was happening all around, not just in Moscow.
So perhaps I wasn’t guilty of hyperbole last week when I wrote about England’s footballers bringing a sense of national unity to a divided nation.
And it was in keeping with Gareth Southgate’s humility that he rejected the idea of triumphal street procession, just for getting into the semi-finals.
His men aren’t heroes, he said. Maybe not, but they put on a heroic show. HEW! He’s gone, leaving behind a trail of diplomatic destruction.
People are still asking “what happened?” after Storm Donald blew over to Moscow.
Charm offensive I understand, but this is the first offensive-offensive I’ve ever seen.
President Trump trashed Theresa May, rubbishing her plan for Brexit and lauding fellow-bouffant Boris Johnson as a great leader for the UK.
He breached Royal protocol – twice – and made the Queen look small in front of her own soldiers.
He scorned London Mayor Saddiq Khan, ignored Jeremy Corbyn and snubbed Scots first minister Nicola Sturgeon.
His whirlwind visit was a show of power-diplomacy, Trump-style.
And it won’t be forgotten in a hurry.
The petulant president tried to bull-talk his way out of bad headlines with a wholly-implausible retraction of everything he’s said, but that trick fooled nobody.
It’s known in the trade as a “reverse ferret.” This one ran up his trousers and bit him where it hurts most.
But behind the vaudeville lies an uncomfortable truth.
Under Donald Trump, Fortress America is going to deal with the rest of the world just how it likes.
The world is his china shop, and he will trample in it to his heart’s content.
The repercussions are, as he would say, bigly tremendous.
We must dramatically increase our military budget, or out goes Nato.
We must have a trade deal with the USA on Trump’s terms, which means a hard Brexit from the EU.
Our banks and companies must stop trading with Iran, and anywhere else Trump dislikes, or face punitive sanctions.
As Tory commentator Matthew Parris puts it: if we leave the EU, we must become either a satellite of Europe or a satellite of America.
I know which one is nearer, in distance and to my heart.