Don’t worry about the protests, Trump, we don’t abandon friends – even those who put kids in cages

When we disagree with a world leader, we get them to change their ways by inviting them to meet the Queen. It works every time

It always helps, when getting over the melancholy following a national sporting drama that promised glory but turned to disappointment, to receive a visit from a psychopathic warmongering misogynist.

What could be more consoling, when Croatia scored their winning goal, than to think: “Never mind football, Donald Trump’s coming home”?

We had to invite him, apparently, because even if we find him a bit peculiar, America is our special friend.

All of us have friends who do things we don’t necessarily agree with. They might drink too much, or make a stew using different ingredients to the ones we’d use ourselves, or sometimes they might take hundreds of young children away from their mothers and shove them in a cage – it doesn’t mean you fall out over it.

It’s easy to criticise, but who of us can honestly say we don’t have a friend who tells survivors of a mass shooting in a school that on no account should they blame people with guns, and that the way to sort it out is give more guns to teachers?

We don’t make an issue of it; we invite them to stay with the Queen.

In any case, I’m sure if Trump told the Queen that if someone assassinated her it would be her own silly fault for not having her own gun, she’d laugh as we always do with friends.

Some politicians suggest that by showing him friendship, we can have a “frank exchange of views” and discuss with him the matters we don’t agree on.

When we disagree with a world leader, we get them to change their ways by inviting them to meet the Queen. It works every time.

It certainly did with Bashar al-Assad, who came on a state visit, and who Tony Blair declared was a “great moderniser” – since then Syria has been a pleasant little outpost, charmingly at one with itself. Blair also became mates with Gaddafi, and from that day on he was a pussycat.

We have to try and talk to Trump, rather than antagonise him. That should work, because if we’ve learned one thing about Trump, it’s that he enjoys admitting he was wrong.

For example, during his campaign for president, he obviously considered very carefully the criticism made of his behaviour, before deciding on balance that it WAS alright to boast about grabbing a woman’s pussy.

And you can hardly blame him for taking toddlers hostage and keeping them in a cage, if no one’s gently pointed out to him this may not provide the most stable environment for a child. We’re not all experts in social services, are we?

In a way, the visit shows how liberal this government has become, because instead of condemning acts that society doesn’t “approve” of, they’re now more understanding about why people behave in an antisocial fashion.

So from now on, if someone is convicted of annoying behaviour, such as locking children in a cage, instead of punishing them – which will only make them feel bad – they’ll be invited to Windsor Castle for tea with the Queen.

The other discussions with Trump should be just as fascinating. For example he’s declared that US funding of Nato will be reduced, as they currently pay 90 per cent of the budget.

It’s actually 22 per cent, but this shows how he’s modernised politics; instead of old-fashioned lying, he does fun-sized lying, which is much harder to discredit.

Rather than make up stuff about £350m a week for the NHS, he’ll do it properly and say: “Everyone in Japan has their own octopus and America has to pay for it, and it’s got to stop”, or “I’m sick of China stealing chunks of the moon. We paid for the moon and Obama gave it away.”

There’s a complaint about Trump that his crime is to “insult the great office of president” with his coarse manner, unlike all previous presidents who have appropriately respected their position.

And you can see why that’s irritating. For example, when Lyndon B Johnson made up a story about US ships being fired on, so he could start a war that killed half a million people and littered napalm across a continent, he did it politely, using proper English, with no mucking about on Twitter.

Maybe the real change with Trump is he routinely carries out acts that, two years ago, would have been considered so outrageous as to lead to resignation. He’s made it alright to defend white supremacists, to not just treat women as pets but boast about it, and to shove kids in cages.

If this carries on, he’ll keep seeing what he can get away with, such as setting fire to kittens, knowing a chunk of the population will say: “It was their own fault for threatening to claw the settee.”

So when ministers say they’ll be talking to Trump as a friend, because “we don’t abandon friends when we disagree with them”, that seems like a coded message. They know they won’t be able to change his mind on anything on their own, so they’re secretly calling for as many people as possible to help them out by greeting him in London on Friday.

Clearly, nothing would please Theresa May and Michael Gove and whoever else is now in the cabinet more, than hundreds of thousands of people gently trying to persuade him not to be quite so much of a sociopath.

Meanwhile, we should feel sorry for the Queen. By Sunday night she’ll have to put up with Philip complaining: “I couldn’t keep up. He’d insulted the Mexicans, Africans, Peruvians, Norwegians and every Muslim individually, and I’d barely started on the Chinese.”