Sit!

When the Brexit argument was going on in Britain I argued that if we left the EU we would come increasingly under the influence of America. (Oddly enough, so did Noam Chomsky.) It seemed to me that it was better to be an equal member of a powerful club than be the lapdog of the latest American president. The mostly aged little Englanders disagreed. They were still labouring under the delusion that Britain was a major world power which could stand alone and meet any other power on at least equal terms.

And now there appears to be a bit of a panic going on. The media are wondering how long it will be before Donald Trump consents to a meeting with our Prime Minister, Keir Starmer. There is talk of Trump disliking Starmer, and being bent on keeping the little guy trembling in the corner for a while. That would be typical of Trump’s mindset after all. And then there is the matter of our increasing economic reliance on the US…

And now I’m trying to conjure an appropriate metaphor – something to do with rescue centres, or dog training facilities, something like that. I’ve already used to term ‘America’s poodle’ in an earlier post and repetition won’t do. I suspect it might prove more serious this time. Trump seems to me to be more emboldened than he was last time out.

In any event, my brain is in no fit state to come up with something pithy, so this will have to do.