and his supporters have laboured to suggest she is weak and unwell.

In a speech in April Mr Trump insinuated that, as secretary of state, Mrs Clinton had failed to protect the four Americans killed by Jihadists in Benghazi in 2012 because she lacked the physical vigour necessary to deal with a night-time emergency. “Instead of taking charge that night, Hillary Clinton decided to go home and sleep. Incredible,” he said.

Like so much of Trump utterance, this was nonsense. The attacks in Benghazi took place in daytime in America, and Mrs Clinton, multiple official investigations suggest, oversaw a creditable official American response to them. Yet the official verdict is not widely believed. Indeed, given that almost half of Republican voters claim to think that “as secretary of state, Hillaryagainst Mrs Clinton for the Senate, and who appears to hate her, has accused her of looking “tired” and “sick”. Katrina Pierson, a Trump spokeswoman, claimed, on the basis of no evidence, that Mrs Clinton has dysphasia, a form of brain damage.

The reality is that Americans really should be a bit concerned about the health of their next president—whoever wins in November. Mrs Clinton would be the second oldest new president after Ronald Reagan, who is thought to have been showing signs of the dementia that would haunt his last years by the time he ended his presidency, aged almost 78. Mr Trump, who is two years older than Mrs Clinton, would be the oldest new president—and, despite his haranguing of Mrs Clinton, he, typically, has broadcast a