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Into the mosh pit: Republican campaign talk getting nastier

FILE - in this Sept, 5, 2011 file photo, former vice presidential candidate and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin speaks at a Tea Party Express Rally in Manchester, N.H. Eyebrows shot up when Palin used a salty acronym, WTF, to mock the policies of President Barack Obama in 2011. How quaint. Five years later, Donald Trump has blown right past acronyms in a profanity-laced campaign for the Republican nomination that has seen multiple candidates hurl insults and disparaging remarks at one another and their critics. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia, File)
FILE - in this Sept, 5, 2011 file photo, former vice presidential candidate and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin speaks at a Tea Party Express Rally in Manchester, N.H. Eyebrows shot up when Palin used a salty acronym, WTF, to mock the policies of President Barack Obama in 2011. How quaint. Five years later, Donald Trump has blown right past acronyms in a profanity-laced campaign for the Republican nomination that has seen multiple candidates hurl insults and disparaging remarks at one another and their critics. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia, File) FILE - in this Sept, 5, 2011 file photo, former vice presidential candidate and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin speaks at a Tea Party Express Rally in Manchester, N.H. Eyebrows shot up when Palin used a salty acronym, WTF, to mock the policies of President Barack Obama in 2011. How quaint. Five years later, Donald Trump has blown right past acronyms in a profanity-laced campaign for the Republican nomination that has seen multiple candidates hurl insults and disparaging remarks at one another and their critics. (AP Photo/Stephan Savoia, File)

By Associated Press 1 min read

WASHINGTON (AP) – The 2016 Republican presidential race is becoming a rhetorical mosh pit, with a profanity-laced Donald Trump leading the way and some of his rivals answering coarsely in kind.

In recent days, Trump has publicly lip-synced the F-bomb, blurted out the S-word more than once, hurled an offensive term for coward at rival Ted Cruz and fired a steady string of put-downs at other candidates whom he labels pathetic, liars, losers, nasty and evil.

In turn, Cruz has said Trump is “losing it,” called out his “Trumpertantrums” and dismissed the billionaire’s insults as “hysterical.”

Jeb Bush has called Trump a loser, liar, whiner and jerk.

Political language expert Robert Lane Greene says the “contest to become the alpha male” has become more obvious this time than in previous elections.