The US president and his broligarch pal are treating their oldest allies as enemies. Britain can’t face down that threat alone

Flood the zone with shit. So advised Steve Bannon, onetime chief strategist for Donald Trump, who understood long ago that if you want to get away with an outrageous act, follow it with another and then another. That way, the media will be sure to move on to the newest horror, so forgetting the one before.

Trump continues to live by that rule, making it hard to keep up with everything he and his circle do and say – and he’s not even back in office yet. It therefore requires a conscious effort to take a step back and see what’s happening. That might be easier this week than others because the most egregious outrages form a pattern, one that poses a severe and direct challenge to Britain and its neighbours.

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist