Donald's threesome with the two Kims

Soon after Donald Trump was elected, there was a scandalous rumour about his use of prostitutes in Russia on a visit there, and of a video tape to prove it. That rumour is considered false today, as it was part of a 'dossier' prepared by a former British secret serviceman in the pay (indirectly) of the Hillary Clinton's Democratic party.

Maybe Trump's opponents thought that it seemed a realistic idea, since Trump was what you could call a 'womaniser' – that is, a man who has a history of multiple female partners, often not lasting a long time. However, the accusation was never widely believed, because it seemed that the man who had Ivana and Melania, and was the father of Ivanka, wouldn't be too interested in Moscow ladies of the night.

When we look at the events of the last two weeks, though, it seems more accurate to see Trump as a 'triangulator', which means a person who forms links easily with many people at the same time, forming 'triangles' of relationships linking often very different people together.

It's two weeks since Trump entertained Kim Kardashian-West (wife of African-American rapper Kanye West, mother of North and Saint, famed for her shapely bottom and TV show). The first Kim to the Whitehouse, then, was a reality star. She went there, however, to represent the interests of Alice Marie Johnson, 63, an African-American great-grandmother serving a life sentence in a US prison for a nonviolent drug offence. Trump accepted Kim's request for a Presidential pardon.

Now Trump has just met with another Kim- Kim Jong-Un, Chairman of the People's Republic of North Korea. It's quite a triangle to form, between the two Kims- both famous, and, some would argue, both wanting to be celebrities in the world. In the past Trump was the owner of the Miss Universe competitions, so he knows a bit about the desire for stardom.

Last weekend, however, there was a different type of meeting, the G7 summit, and Trump looked much less happy with the company he kept. It was a meeting full of anger from the leaders of countries like Canada and Germany because of Trump's new tariffs on their exports to America.

Looked at in another way, though, this could be seen as another form of triangulation, this time with the voters of the Midwest who actually made the difference electorally between Trump and Hillary Clinton. They depend on manufacturing for their livelihoods. And of course, looked at in another way, Trump's alliance with Kim Kardashian is a way to reach the African-American population that so routinely vote Democrat.

Will Trump's action with the second Kim be successful? Will Kim Jong Un, despite his terrible early years as leader, be the man to bring North Korea back to the modern world. The answer is difficult to be sure of, but the indicators are interesting.

The first thing is that Kim has already been meeting with the South Koreans in a way that has no precedent. His choice was to meet on the border between North and South and to walk backwards and forwards across the border with the South Korean President. The symbolism of this, and the meeting with Trump, will create pressure on him to show that he is decisive and has made a firm decision. Of course, it is probably true that Kim's North Korea has run out of money, but why just now? Is it Trump's pressure on China (diplomatic and economic)? Whatever the answer, Trump is the Great Triangulator, and that means bringing sharp angles to a strict point.

Why Free Tommy Robinson is right

Normally not a fan of direct action, I am making an exception in this case. I did post about this earlier, but I realised something important thanks to a commenter on disqus. The point was that (contrary to my expectation) Tommy Robinson's jail term was only 3 months for breaching the suspended sentence he'd been given for filming and streaming outside a trial, and 10 months tacked on for the offence identified on the day of the breach (filming and streaming outside another trial). I had assumed it was the other way round.  The injustice is therefore multiplied, when a man can receive a summary 10 month sentence for an offence for which he has not received a trial, on the basis presumably that it mirrors an offence for which he was tried and convicted. No,  No, No. Habeas Corpus.

Brexit and the spirit of Cobden

If you, like me, considered the best argument for Brexit to be sovereignty, then maybe you, like me, considered an essential advantage of sovereignty apart from the EU to be the ability to pursue free trade, away from the common European Tariff. This core aspect of leaving the EU has been targeted by Michel Barnier through the point of attack of the Irish border with Northern Ireland. You can't have free movement of people between North and South without a common trade policy, the argument runs. The attempt is to make the economic political and thereby put politics ahead of economics.

The same has been true with the Euro-crisis, though. Every time someone has tried to put economics first, the EU has intervened politically. Greece once (using the IMF to strong-arm Tsipras), Italy twice (Mario Monti replacing euro-sceptic Berlusconi in 2011; Paolo Savona in 2018 rejected as Finance Minister for euro-sceptic views), and Spain didn't need intervention only because of the bloody-minded Francoism of (thankfully ex-) Prime Minister Rajoy (which required the EU's acquiescence to the suppression of Catalonian concerns as Spain's richest region).

Amidst this tumult of discord, the still small voice of Richard Cobden beckons us to listen. It was Cobden, after all, who established the anti-corn law league which finally brought relief to Ireland at the height of the potato famine by allowing imported corn to replace deficiencies at home. It was also Cobden who reached out to France and via the Cobden-Chevalier treaty, which imposed a maximum level on tariffs, secured a doubling of trade between the two countries. It was furthermore Cobden who criticised the mercantilist policies pursued by the British representatives in China during the Second Opium War.

Thus on the one hand we have political gamesmanship and chicanery masquerading as real-politik, and on the other hand critical engagement with positive social intent. The latter spirit is what inspired Brexit, the spirit of Cobden, and that's what has to win through today and, I would say, for all time.

As to the practical question of the Irish border, the issue is too minute to be generally discussed. The question of EU-bound trade from the North would be mainly of produce destined for the South of Ireland. Likewise in the opposite direction it would be a question only (or mainly) of consumables from South to North.  To ensure this was the case (and not some grand scheme of tariff avoidance) there could be an obligation to declare the intention to 'export-on' when crossing the Irish land border, combined with an obligation for transports above a certain value (either individual or cumulative) to register and detail that trade electronically. What it means is accepting basic principles that will be worked out on the ground and on the go. To make politics of this economic footnote is in the worst tradition of European demagoguery. Give me Cobdenism every time.