Four-year-old X blended in perfectly in the Oval Office with all the other bogeymen

Regardless of anxiety by most parents about over-sharing, Elon Musk brought one of his sons to the White House

- Catherine Bennett

If the reversal of declining birthrates is genuinely a preoccupation of Elon Musk's, recent reviews suggest that the exhibition of his four-year-old son, "X", may not be the most effective fertility stimulus.

That there is more chance of the exact opposite, a global stampede for contraceptives, remains likely even if X can be persuaded not to pick his nose and, as the world witnessed last week, idly consume its contents beside the US president's Resolute desk. I say "idly". Donald Trump, in attendance, introduced X as "a high IQ individual". Behind his show of mucoid innocence, the prodigy may have been reflecting, with wry amusement at the double standards, that no woman in his father's role would get away with bringing a docile child to a presidential press conference, still less one as irksome as himself. Did Ursula von der Leyen, for instance, ever showcase even one of her seven children at a political event? No, X probably figured, she can't have: she made it to president of the European Commission.

Health note: if these X visits are to be a regular thing, Trump's staff may want to consider that nose picking is a major source of colonisation by Streptococcus pneumoniae bacteria, from which older people, such as the self-styled "germaphobe" president, 78, are particularly at risk. The contaminated desk has already been removed for cleaning: ideally it should be replaced with one of a low height and anti-bacterial material better suited to occupants of the Little Fascists day nursery.

It was noted that, immediately after X's performance, the president selected the least repulsive child from available Trumps, and presented the five-year-old, dressed in a Maga cap, for public inspection at the Daytona 500 racetrack.