How Britain should handle a Trump visit, by the former ambassador to Washington

For reasons I find hard to fathom the French did not come out in force to riot against the recent visit of President Trump to France. Normally the mildest provocation has them pouring into the streets to do battle with the Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité, the CRS, notorious for their brutal handling of demonstrators. My wife, half-French herself, suggested that the quiescence of the French public reflected respect for Bastille Day, which President Macron had invited Trump to celebrate. I pooh-poohed that on the grounds that the storming of the Bastille in 1789 marked the beginning of the venerable French tradition of public rioting and was if anything a spur to violent protest against Trump. Perhaps the more likely explanation was the start of the French summer holidays or the exhaustion of the French contingent at the G20 riots in Hamburg a few days previously. Or the French were just pleased to score one over the rosbifs and get Trump to Paris before London and to do it in style.