Blighty newsletter: The king’s speech

Hello from London. This week in Blighty:

When visiting America these days I am often struck by how little Britain seems to matter there. It rarely features in the news, and barely crops up as a topic of conversation. The same is not true the other way around: Brits hear and talk a lot about America, from Trump to tech. This of course reflects the two countries’ relative weight in the world. And it helps explain why the “special relationship”, as we wrote in our latest issue, is more special to Britain than to America.

If Americans do ask about anything related to Britain, more often than not it tends to be about the royal family. What do you make of Harry and Meghan? How will Andrew’s involvement with Jeffrey Epstein affect the king’s standing? So the four-day royal visit to America, which began yesterday, plays to a certain American fascination.

It also plays into fraught politics. Formally to mark the 250th anniversary of America’s independence, the visit has taken on extra significance because it comes at a dire time in Anglo-American relations. Donald Trump is furious with Britain for its failure to stand by America from the start of its war with Iran. (“This is not Winston Churchill we’re dealing with,” he said witheringly of Sir Keir Starmer, the prime minister.) For his part, Sir Keir is “fed up” with the trouble America’s war is creating for Britons. At the turn of the century four-fifths of people in each country held a favourable view of the other. American views of Britons have cooled somewhat, and British approval of Americans has plummeted: now just one in three Brits thinks positively of their transatlantic cousins.

Americans have mixed opinions on King Charles III: according to a recent YouGov poll, he has a net favourability rating in America of minus 1 percentage point. Perhaps that’s still partly a Diana effect, which may be gradually wearing off—15 years ago his net rating was minus 18 points. Crucially, though, one American who has an extremely positive view of the king is Mr Trump. The president has consistently spoken warmly about Charles, calling him a “great guy” and reserving his barbs for the prime minister.

Which is why those in Britain who argued that this week’s visit put the king in an invidious position, and should not go ahead, were wrong. The risks were low, the potential benefits not trivial. After all, the family has lots of experience of this stuff: Charles’s mother met 13 of the 14 American presidents from Truman to Trump (for some reason Lyndon Johnson missed out).

The king and queen arrived in a Washington, DC, that was still digesting the drama of the shooting at the White House correspondents’ dinner on Saturday. Charles planned to tell a joint session of Congress today that the two countries have repeatedly “found ways to come together”, stressing their deep bonds and the value of the relationship for global security. The relationship may be uneven nowadays but in some areas—notably intelligence sharing and nuclear weapons—the two countries are still exceptionally intertwined.

For sure, it will take more than pomp and pageantry to save Britain’s alliance with America. But on Capitol Hill and at a banquet at the White House the king has a chance to change the mood music, at least briefly.

Do you think royal diplomacy makes a blind bit of difference? Please send your thoughts to blightynewsletter@economist.com.