Now here’s a rare thing. A sentence everybody can agree on, Remainers, Leavers, Bored-to-deathers: Britain is cutting a truly pathetic figure abroad these days.

Have we ever looked so weak, so daft, such an irrelevant, if amusing, sideshow on the fringes of the international stage?

I have many journalist friends both on the continent and in the US. They are absolutely as one in their view of what has happened here since the referendum. Their reaction has an uncannily unified pattern:

Shock begat bemusement begat amazement begat amusement begat boredom.

“I have given up on you,” a German editor told me recently. “Everything I thought about the British - their pragmatism, their cleverness, their sense of dignity. It’s all been absolutely shattered in the last two years. You’re a international joke now.”

Or to put it another way, as former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis told GQ's Jonathan Heaf: “Brexit is like watching a train crash in slow motion.”

Indicators of our decline in influence abound.

Just in the last 24 hours, two news items symbolise the erosion of our status since 23 June 2016.

Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg, long the target of Damian Collins’ Culture Media And Sports Select Committee investigation into social media, has decided not to bother appearing in the UK, instead agreeing to go before the EU parliament instead.

And yesterday, in Sofia, Theresa May stands beside French president Emmanuel Macron and German chancellor Angela Merkel as the European Union stakes a claim to be the “the guarantor of international stability” in the face of Donald Trump’s nationalistic capriciousness.

Now we are realigning ourselves with the European order, just as we are planning to vacate our chair at the top table.

Mrs May’s dash to Trump’s embrace, on the rebound from our decision to leave our partner of 45 years, seemed obsequious at the time. So it has proved. Any sense that the Special Relationship might actually live up to that name has been dispelled.

Whichever way Brexit eventually plays out, serious and irreparable damage has been done to Britain.

In terms of lasting reputational damage, it’s hard to find comparison in our modern history. The Suez crisis of 1956 comes closest.

Britain and France’s botched attempt to depose Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser and regain control of the Suez Canal resulted in open humiliation as we were forced to pull out under pressure from the United States and United Nations.

The Suez Crisis was seen as the end of empire. The end of Britain’s hard power.

Now we see the coming end of our soft power - the disproportionate influence this small island wields globally, our ability to shape events either to our interests, or in the pursuit of some greater goal.

That’s all but gone now.

It must occur to even the most extreme Brextremist, that Boris Johnson’s vision of a new bold, expansive, ambitious reincarnation of our island as a “Global Britain” powerhouse look about as likely as 18/1 shots England lifting the World Cup.

Instead of a strident Global Britain, we have today the inglorious spectacle of both significant political parties, almost two years after the Referendum vote, with no firm position on what Brexit means for you and me and every other poor sap who fleetingly believed there would be a plan.

Suez cost Anthony Eden his job.

But the threshold of prime ministerial competency has fallen so low that Theresa May maintains power despite a disastrous general election, the ignominious departure of four cabinet ministers, the botched handling of both Grenfell and Windrush scandals and a chronic rebellion in the House of Lords.

The daily update on the Customs Union debate within cabinet is news that we may be forced ask an unwilling EU to extend the transition period, while we work out a course of action that doesn’t upset the DUP, Leo Varadkar, Boris, Jacob, David, Liam or anyone else in possession of both toys and pram.

It has been officially denied but it is reported at least four cabinet ministers believe this to be our only hope.

If we do ask the EU for an extension, it will be a new low in our status as a nation. Some sovereignty this is turning out to be. Some control.

In her urgent denials, Theresa May again reasserted the three tricks she will pull off once this Brexit negotiation is concluded:

1 We will have our own trade policy with the rest of the world. 2 We will have frictionless trade with the EU. 3 There will be no physical border with Ireland.

To make a metaphor with a fruit basket - which feels strangely appropriate - she wants an apple that tastes like an orange and peels like a banana.

Basketcase Britain indeed.

Now read:

Remain can't just reason its way out of Brexit

Calling someone a 'gammon' is hate speech

Yanis Varoufakis: ‘Brexit is like watching a train crash in slow motion’

Will the talkative progressives overcome the silent conservatives?