One of the biggest insults in America is to accuse a politician of “stolen valour”. This usually applies to some minor exaggeration about rank or military service that emerges from forensic opposition research into a rival’s CV. It can be more blatant, as in the case of the cosplaying fake admiral, Jonathan Carley, who blagged his way into British Remembrance Day parades.

But surely the most shameless display of “stolen valour” is Donald Trump’s needy and greedy snatch of Maria Corina Machado’s Nobel Peace Prize. The Venezuelan opposition leader offered it to him and he took it from her like a Mafia don accepting an ill-gotten tribute. Any US commander-in-chief worth the name would have insisted she won it, she deserved it, and it was hers to keep.

The Nobel Committee in Norway stressed that the award cannot be “revoked, shared, or transferred to others”, but the US President disagreed.

Instead, Machado left the White House with nothing to show for her visit but a “swag bag” of party favours bearing Trump’s name. The biggest laugh is that Trump claimed on Truth........

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