Today on Coffee House

He did it. Donald Trump made it through four years, not an accomplishment many of his detractors thought he would achieve, or even wanted him to. ‘See you soon,’ Trump said. A promise or a threat? The truth is that Trump has been badly diminished by his antics in the past few weeks, starting but not ending with the melee on 6 January. His enemies didn’t torpedo his presidency. He torpedoed himself. Trump’s valedictory remarks on Tuesday gave the game away.

It’s official: the inauguration is over, the speeches have been given, and political power in the United States has been transferred to new hands. Joe Biden, a man who first entered the national spotlight in 1972 as a young senator from Delaware, is now the 46th president of the United States. Biden is the quintessential politician, someone who is an expert glad-hander and in many ways a creature of Washington. He knows how power is wielded, understands how to smooth the bloated egos of lawmakers, and is the one person his former boss, Barack Obama, felt comfortable taking the lead in negotiations with Republicans.

Parliament, 0. Computer Bugs 1. That was the score at PMQs today after a software glitch turned the debate into a cyber-shambles. The disaster unfolded as Ian Blackford asked his two questions. The SNP member, wearing a smart three-piece suit, joined the chamber from his sumptuously appointed country seat in the Hebrides. Blackford is known as a champion of the people and today he had a golden opportunity to stir up trouble for Boris.

Well, now that we’re all fired up about Britain’s moral role in the world courtesy of Theresa May, who is indignant about cuts to the overseas aid budget, how about moving on to Pakistan? This week a Pakistani court has ruled that a 12-year-old Christian girl, Farah Shaheen, consented to her marriage with an alleged abductor over twice her age and consented freely to convert to Islam. When the girl was recovered from the household of Khisar Ahmed Ali in December, she was reportedly too traumatised to speak about what happened to her over the five months since she, ah, consented to marry a 29-year-old and convert to Islam.