For anyone with even a vague sense of history, one of the most perplexing things about the current age of populism is how it has normalised the absurd.

Brexit, for example, continues to be described by large numbers of people as a legitimate and positive expression of political advancement, while those with an eye on the future know that economics textbooks read by our grandchildren will characterise it as an egregious act of national self-immolation.

Similarly, the success of extreme right parties in France, Austria, Hungary, and Poland are likely to be portrayed in history books in terms similar to the rise of nationalism that swept much of Europe in the 1930s.

Perhaps the most difficult thing for future generations to get their heads around, will be why Americans elected a tangerine manblob criminal as president of the world’s most powerful nation not once, but twice.

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History may be littered with examples of rulers who were mad, bad or both. The emperor, Caligula, appointed his horse as a consul; Ivan the Terrible murdered his son in a fit of pique; and George III spent his final years running around Kew Palace in his jammies, with a pencil stuffed up each nostril, shouting “wibble”.

At least the people of ancient Rome, Tsarist Russia and 18th century England had the excuse of never having voted for these characters.

Times are far from certain. Just as the rise of European fascism followed the collapse of the imperial order and a global economic depression, the current wave of populism is a response to the aftermaths of a series of generational catastrophes, including the 2008 financial crash and the global pandemic.

In the relative sanity of Scotland, we have the small consolation of........

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