Boris Johnson is absolutely right to say that his successor as London Mayor, Sadiq Khan, has behaved like a ‘puffed up pompous popinjay’ about Donald Trump’s cancelled visit to Britain. And they aren’t the only ones. The whole ‘Trump visit’ story has become an embarrassing mass exercise in British grandstanding.
In fact, if you want a perfect example of British delusional thinking look not at Brexit, look instead at the way we have handled the prospect President Donald J Trump’s arrival on our shores. Nothing better illustrates our sense of self-importance, our priggishness, and our ability to convince ourselves of rubbish if it makes us feel good.
Long before Trump was the Republican nominee, our Parliament had a full debate about banning him from our shores because he had said right-wing things we deemed unacceptable. MPs actually discussed whether Trump was such a threat to British values that he should be blocked from entry or whether he should be taken to a curry house in order to show what a wonderfully diverse country we are.
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