Putin has proposed to Obama, only moments after POTUS had ceased courting the King of Saudi Arabia. The pre-nuptial agreement drafted by President Putin awards the Sevastopol dolphins to the Russian navy (dolphins guard the Crimean naval base against deep-sea mines and alien frogmen), while the Ukrainians get to keep the sea lions which are also based there.

On camera, UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg refused to look directly at Nigel Farage, leader of theUK Independence Party and Clegg’s opponent in Wednesday night’s televised debate over Britain’s membership of the EU. Clegg looked away because he didn’t want to be seen viewing Farage as a fully credible interlocutor; but he couldn’t simply stare straight ahead or he himself would have been cast asthe Westminster Village idiot. Nowhere else for his eyes to go but down, and downcast eyes made him demur; a blushing bride compared to the front-footed Farage, who was clearly keen to exercise his conjugal rights.

Clegg has much to be modest about, after nearly four years as DPM in a dubious government.

Meanwhile in Brighton, the pioneering couple looked like a pair of original Teddy boys. Not the young toughs who hijacked the Edwardian-style tailoring designed in the early 1950s as an ode to the joy ofwinning the war; more like the young toffs that the post-war frock coats and suede collars were first intended for.

Writer and actor Andrew Wale and guest house owner Neil Allard wore three piece whistles, complete with suede collared jackets and pin collar shirts, when shortly after midnight on Saturday 29 March they entered the Music Room of the Brighton Pavilion (more Rococo than rock’n’roll) to become one of the first same-sex couples married under English law.

After the ceremony, the newlyweds stepped into a blaze of publicity so intense it turned night into day.The whole world was invited to their nuptials – except Nigel Farage. read more