This is why what is happening is not surprising: she represents the continuity of misgovernment that has angered and frightened Americans; a sure recipe for defeat, except that the alternative is so radical a change of pace and personality he gives the forces of change pause. Trump’s strength is that he has never sought public office, elected or otherwise and has brilliantly made himself the evocator and the voice of all Americans who are outraged at what has been done to their country. Beginning shortly after the greatest and most bloodless victory in the history of the nation state — the triumph of the West, under the leadership of the United States in the Cold War — the United States gives every appearance of having become a nation of idiots incapable, as Trump points out with endearing zest, of doing anything right. He has the weakness of his strengths and the fault of his qualities. And the Democrats cannot run on their record, as two thirds of the American people think the country has been going in the wrong direction for years, so the only path to re-election is through attacking Trump personally.

He is not at all the sociopath that is claimed, or even the boor he sometimes seems. Personally, his conversation is a good deal less coarse than Hillary Clinton’s, and his demeanour is more equable. But he is a vintage American blowhard. This has sometimes extended to locker-room, towel-snapping bravura, and the Democrats have levered on that to claim that he is a sexist, a racist, and now, a molester of vulnerable females. One side parades the female accusers of Bill Clinton and the other complainants against Trump who stayed silent for decades. Hillary Clinton is compulsively untruthful. She was effectively accused by the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, under oath, of having repeatedly lied, under oath. The Clinton Foundation, which only distributes seven per cent of its income, has received generous gifts from those seeking the favours of the State Department. The Clintons had a net worth of zero when they left office and now they have from $150 million to $200 million. Where does anyone suppose the money came from?

This is a uniquely tawdry presidential race because one candidate is culturally offensive to half the people, but is the only alternative to a person who has serious problems with probity and is a continuation of a sleazy and broken-down system that a majority wants changed drastically. The price of change is Donald and the cost of avoiding Donald is Hillary. So it is not surprising that the campaign has plumbed the depths it has, and that the match is so negative. Nor is it, in the long term, alarming.