So now Theresa May knows what it’s like to be Tangoed. Her visit to Washington, hailed a ‘triumph’ by friendly newspapers, has become a liability. Life comes at you fast, especially when you launch a diplomatic initiative on a wing and a prayer, not in response to a clinical evaluation of its likely outcome.
Because who can really be surprised that hugging Donald Trump close would so swiftly induce a form of diplomatic blowback? Who is surprised that tying yourself to an administration as vicious as it is incompetent might prove a high-risk enterprise?
The Prime Minister played two roles on her trip to the United States. She was both supplicant and counsellor. Supplicant because, especially post-Brexit, her need to curry favour with the new American president was stronger than ever; counsellor because this particular president needs all the help he can get.
There was, I am afraid, more than a whiff of Greeks and Romans about May’s visit.
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