Rambling Biden is on the ropes – will his Democratic challengers strike?

The president’s poll ratings are a horror show, and even Democrats want him out, writes veteran US-watcher Jon Sopel. After another stumbling performance in front of the cameras, will his rivals seize their moment?

Joe Biden’s recent speech in Vietnam was slow, a tiny bit slurred and barely audible (AP)

If you were to ask Joe Biden, he’d probably agree entirely with Claudius in Hamlet where he says that “when sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions”. The US president might upgrade battalions to brigades or even divisions, such has been the quantity of ordure hitting the AC unit this past week.

In many ways, Biden has had a successful week globetrotting, with some serious achievements in India at the G20 and then building relations in Vietnam, where the White House wants to show China that the pivot towards Asia Pacific is serious, and that the US stands with its allies.

But as any foreign leader knows, just because you are strutting the international stage, it doesn’t mean your domestic woes are left behind.