‘Popular with his people throughout life, though now mocked in death, George III embodied the spirit of the nation like no other before him, serving as a stalwart bastion around whom his subjects could rally in the shadow of Napoleonic aggression.’

It is possible that the stipulations of the new immigration system will be even less popular than the current one- or, I should say, would be, if people saw beyond the spin.

These pervasive attitudes have not stopped at destroying public discourse. They have also entered the halls of many of our institutions, including our universities and schools, which, some might testify, had their dams surreptitiously burst years ago.

We are obsessed with political freedom for its own sake, we deify it, praise it, hollowly chant the words that represent it as if we still know what they mean. What is good about freedom? Why do we value it?

Still traumatised by Clinton’s shock defeat, Democrats are terrified of complacency. Indeed, they are currently just as likely to distrust the polls as the president’s own supporters.

Support for eradicating proposition 209 rests on the ground that it is a barrier to practicing ‘affirmative action’, the nice-sounding Orwellian-crafted phrase meaning – in as clear English as possible – racial discrimination.

Intellectuals are the worst for taking a long time to say nothing at all, such as by stringing together Latin and Greek derived words or jargon in place of actual communication.

Make no mistake; the Conservative Party does not care about Britain. It is uninterested in where our goods are made, so long as the price is right, and only touts its love of the nation in a despairingly successful attempt to win votes.