'Feeble, tired and unfit' Biden plays hardball with Trump

With November set to be one of the most consequential elections in US history, it would be understandable if Donald Trump and Joe Biden reached for lofty rhetoric: if they attempted to match the highminded ideals of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and the rest of the nation's founding fathers.

- Adam Gabbatt

American voters, and the country's political class, are long used to Trump's insult-laden and often crude rhetoric. "Everything Joe Biden touches turns to shit," Trump said in Georgia last month, during a rally at which he also mocked Biden's stutter.

But recently Biden and his campaign team appear to have decided to fight fire with fire, after previously seeking to stay above the fray. It's a shift that seems to accept that Trump has moved the standards of US politics.

But it also probably reflects the unique threat that Trump's bid to return to the White House for a second term represents to American democracy and that the time to sugar-coat the fight against that is long past. For many, Biden and his team's insults aren't just political hardball, they also smack of the truth.

In recent months, Biden has dubbed Trump "mentally unfit", while last week his campaign declared the US "deserves better than a feeble, confused and tired Donald Trump".

They've also taken to calling Trump, who was recently unable to pay a courtordered $454m bond, "Broke Don".