On Thursday Donald Trump will be greeted in London by what remains of the British government, which, at the time of writing, was a valet, an astrologer and two tour guides dressed as wombles Great Uncle Bulgaria and Orinoco. President Trump will be very impressed. His itinerary in Britain, like his life, is an exercise in avoiding the filth and squalor of the upper-middle class in favour of fantastical displays of excess. He will be whisked from one 18th-century palace to the next, preside over military pomp and be entrained by bagpipers. Or, as he calls it, "brunch". He will also meet the queen, an awkward encounter made even more so when he asks her why she signs things "Elizabeth R" and not "Helen Mirren". This week I’ve seen some South Africans relishing the kitsch shabbiness of Trump’s visit. They have expressed a certain schadenfreude at the prospect of a bigoted buffoon parading around a Disney fantasy of colonial Britain, a sign, they gleefully claim, of two wicked powers in...
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