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For Biden and Trump, that anger also has a physical component, redolent of toxic masculinity. After news of the Access Hollywood tape came out, Biden said of Trump, "If we were in high school, I'd take him behind the gym and beat the hell out of him." More recently, he said that Trump was like "the bully that used to make fun when I was a kid that I stutter, and I'd smack him in the mouth."

Trump, too, loves to present himself as a fighter, gleefully sharing a video that portrayed him as a wrestler body-slamming the media.

Anger bolsters these candidates for a lot of reasons. It's used to signal virility, a heartiness and strength that the three septuagenarian candidates need to harness to convince voters that, despite their age, they're still capable of throwing a punch. In fact, the way they've coalesced around anger is a sign of how few emotional options are open to them, as both men and as elderly people, two groups who feel enormous pressure to avoid any signs of weakness.

They're also tapping into a deep well of anger in the nation. We are in an age of political rage, rage that has found a home in movements ranging from the Tea Party to Black Lives Matter to the #MeToo movement. Books like "Mad as Hell," "Eloquent Rage," and "Good and Mad" have presented rage as a powerful, and often positive, political emotion.

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Only one kind of anger counts in the 2020 race - CNN