Walter Mondale ran a depressive, cautionary race, preaching selflessness and self-denial, his speeches like the parable of the Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf (the savage, devouring deficit).

Background: a Wolf And a rabbit is my daughter's favourite story in which she likes to act as the rabbit.

We 've all heard the story of the third Little Pig, who foiled the hyperventilating Wolf by building his house out of bricks, rather than with straw or sticks as his brothers had done.