Biden has zero PC.

But it also reflected a more disturbing reality for the 79-year-old president: in the space of just 17 months, he has already burnt a lot of the political capital he had when he walked into the Oval Office in January last year.

According to the Realclearpolitics.com polling average, just 39.6 per cent of voters approve of Biden’s performance in the White House so far, compared with 54.9 per cent who disapprove — a wide gap of 15 percentage points that will be hard to close.

On its own, Biden’s ratings slump could bring a midterm loss big enough to [devastate] cripple his legislative agenda for the rest of his first term in office. But it will also raise doubts about his viability as a candidate for re-election in 2024. He says he intends to run for a second term, health permitting.

Things could still get worse. Biden is facing not just political polarisation and rising prices but the risk of a recession that could hit around the time that his re-election campaign begins. Having initially moved cautiously to tackle inflation, Federal Reserve chair Jay Powell is now being more aggressive in pushing for higher rates, and said on Wednesday that a downturn was “certainly a possibility”.

Although Biden has backed the central banker, a sharply slowing economy may inflict a new blow to his own political prospects and those of fellow Democrats. All things considered, Biden is facing the worst possible environment for an incumbent in need of a bounce back.