For once, I’m with Peter Mandelson. Our Man In Washington says Donald Trump should be welcomed with open arms when he makes his State visit in September because ‘he really does love Britain’.

You don’t have to agree with the President’s policies, or admire the cut of his jib, to acknowledge that as leader of our most important military ally and trading partner he is worthy of respect.

Like it or not, we all live in Trump World now, as Chelsea footballers discovered when he hijacked their Club World Cup winning celebrations in New Jersey on Sunday.

Poor old Cole Palmer, Man of the Match, was utterly bewildered as The Donald turned the trophy presentation into yet another MAGA photo-call.

That’s just who he is. Mandelson, to his credit, has worked out that the best way to handle Trump is to tickle his tummy. So, too, has Surkeir, much as it must stick in his craw.

Sadly, this vital realpolitik cuts no ice with vast swathes of Labour backbenchers and Left-wing activists. That’s why, although Trump has been afforded a historic second State visit, he won’t be addressing Parliament. The trip has been timed deliberately while the Commons is in recess.

It’s because the juvenile, agitprop rabble on the backbenches can’t be trusted to behave themselves. Even before details of the visit were published, 15 Labour MPs – including Dianne Abbott and a bunch of brain-dead no-marks – had signed a motion calling on the Speakers of both Houses to prevent the President making a Parliamentary speech.

For once, Richard Littlejohn agrees with Peter Mandelson (third from left). You don’t have to agree with the President’s policies to acknowledge that as leader of our most important military ally and trading partner he is worthy of respect

Poor old Cole Palmer, Man of the Match, was utterly bewildered as The Donald turned Chelsea's trophy presentation into yet another MAGA photo-call

To hell with the national interest, these puerile political pygmies decided to make it all about them. The Government couldn’t run the risk of mass walkouts or heckles during a Trump address. Trump’s love for Britain will be forever unrequited.

Were he to be grossly insulted by MPs, the capricious, thin-skinned President would be perfectly capable of – and arguably justified in – stomping back to the White House and slapping 100 per cent tariffs on all British exports.

For similar reasons, nor will the President get a carriage ride down the Mall to Buckingham Palace? Last time he made a State visit, in 2019, tens of thousands of demonstrators flooded central London, complete with effigies of him sitting on a toilet and a Baby Trump blimp being flown over Trafalgar Square with the blessing of mayor Genghis Khan. Had he been invited to address Parliament, the usual Far-Left rent-a-mob would have been out in force yet again, no doubt with a sympathetic Metropolitan Police escort.

We have become inured to the weekly anti-Semitic, pro-Hamas marches. The mob will always be with us. But we are entitled to hold our elected representatives to a higher standard. Even if they had to bite their tongues, they should have rolled out the red carpet for Trump.

Former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were both invited to address Parliament, to great acclaim. Neither were great friends of Britain. Clinton, like Biden, was sympathetic to the IRA and helped broker the Long Good Friday surrender agreement.

Obama harboured irrational grudges about Britain’s alleged treatment of his African ancestors and removed Winston Churchill’s bust from the Oval Office. Yet both were received rapturously by star-stuck MPs.

Last week they were fawning over France’s pipsqueak President Macron, certainly no friend of the UK, who abused our hospitality by taking the opportunity to trash the British people’s democratic vote to leave the EU. That’s when he’s not stealing our fish, trying to exclude us from European defence contracts and sending tens of thousands of illegal migrants our way. Macron clearly holds Britain in contempt. Yet our politicians were all over him like a cheap suit.

Trump, on the other hand, really does love Britain. He has invested hundreds of millions of dollars of his own money in Scottish golf courses, backed Brexit and, while declaring tariff wars on the rest of the world - the EU in particular – has given us preferential treatment.

We have been spared the highest tariffs and talks are continuing over a more comprehensive trade deal. I don’t suppose it has occurred to the morons on Labour’s backbenches that without Trump’s relative leniency towards this country, thousands of their own constituents in the steel and automotive industries would now be facing life on the dole.

We live in an increasingly precarious world. We need the US onside, both militarily and economically. Fortunately, the Government gets the reality – however reluctantly and flatters Trump accordingly. So, too, does The King, who will entertain the President lavishly at Windsor Castle, where they can throw a benevolent, ceremonial ring of steel around him and eliminate hostile noises off.

Despite this, for much of our tone-deaf, small town, self-regarding political class, the President remains persona non grata, just another convenient excuse to flaunt their own, half-baked virtue, no matter how much it threatens to damage their own country. The notion that while can dislike the man, you must respect the office is alien to them.

Will they ever grow up? Don’t hold your breath. For the grandstanding goons on the Far-Left Trump’s love for Britain will be forever unrequited.