I agree largely with Josh Voorhes who I quoted earlier.
"Most of these decisions were of the resource-allocation variety, which are easy to second guess with the benefit of hindsight. Knowing what we do now, you don’t need to be a high-priced political strategist to say that Sanders should have focused a little more on Iowa and a little less on New Hampshire, or that he should have spent more money in Nevada or more time making inroads with the black community well before the primary race reached the South. But a candidate only has so much time and so much money, and spending those resources in one place means you have less to spend in another. Given Clinton’s massive advantages, Sanders could only look so far ahead without running the risk of being knocked out early. Sure, his blowout win in New Hampshire probably came with some diminishing returns, but a loss there would have brought a swift end to his campaign before the race even reached more diverse states like Nevada and South Carolina. (To say nothing of the fact that Sanders entered the race with the primary goal of pulling Clinton to the left—and he succeeded!—something that required a different strategy than a better-positioned challenger would have used.)"
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/04/josh-voorhes-on-bernie-autopsy.html
In general this is true, it's always easy to second guess in hindsight. Usually, though, the reality is every choice of resource-allocation carries its own opportunity cost.
I agree with Sargent that had Bernie gone negative earlier it would have been counterproductive.
"Given how crucial that broader story-line has been to Sanders’s candidacy — that our political system and media are dithering while the middle class, our democracy, and our planet are facing quasi-existential threats from creeping oligarchy and climate change — it might have been difficult for him to prosecute a case against Clinton’s email arrangement. For many Dems the media obsession with it had already become a symbol of the dysfunctional, frivolous Beltway political culture Sanders is running against."
"The idea that Sanders didn’t attack Clinton hard enough over her Wall Street speeches also deserves some skepticism. The Sanders campaign aired an ad implicitly hitting Clinton over the speeches as early as the end of January, before the very first voting in the Iowa caucuses. What’s more, Sanders’s criticism of Clinton over Wall Street money has long been problematic for him, too, because it shed light back on to a tension within his own candidacy. Sanders has offered up a critique of our broader system as corrupt and in thrall to big money interests, which has had the salutary effect of forcing the topic squarely on to the Democratic agenda. But his campaign has sometimes seemed to equivocate on whether it wants to be seen implying that Clinton herself is bought and paid for, or at least that her policy positions are the direct result of donations to her campaign. One charitable interpretation is that Sanders has been uncomfortable with this latter implication, but that he and his campaign have at times succumbed to the temptation to indulge in it, because, after all, he’s trying to defeat her."
"In October, as they gathered at a hotel outside Las Vegas to prepare for the first Democratic debate, Mr. Sanders’s advisers urged him to challenge Mrs. Clinton over accepting $675,000 from Goldman Sachs for delivering three speeches, according to two Sanders advisers. They thought the speaking fees meshed with the senator’s message about Wall Street excess and a rigged America. But Mr. Sanders, hunched over a U-shaped conference table, rejected it as a personal attack on Mrs. Clinton’s income — the sort of character assault he has long opposed. She has the right to make money, he offered."
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/04/us/politics/bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton.html?_r=0
So why exactly does she no longer have the right to make money?
Again, I will argue that maybe his attacks on her speeches actually have hurt him. He is now negative 7 in his own approval rating.
This is the problem with correlation and causation. You never know what causes what. After he won Michigan, he assumed that this was thanks to hitting trade deals hard. But then the same strategy bore no fruit in Ohio as he also lost Missouri and Illinois.
The idea that going negative earlier would have helped him is a theory very much in doubt.
"Most of these decisions were of the resource-allocation variety, which are easy to second guess with the benefit of hindsight. Knowing what we do now, you don’t need to be a high-priced political strategist to say that Sanders should have focused a little more on Iowa and a little less on New Hampshire, or that he should have spent more money in Nevada or more time making inroads with the black community well before the primary race reached the South. But a candidate only has so much time and so much money, and spending those resources in one place means you have less to spend in another. Given Clinton’s massive advantages, Sanders could only look so far ahead without running the risk of being knocked out early. Sure, his blowout win in New Hampshire probably came with some diminishing returns, but a loss there would have brought a swift end to his campaign before the race even reached more diverse states like Nevada and South Carolina. (To say nothing of the fact that Sanders entered the race with the primary goal of pulling Clinton to the left—and he succeeded!—something that required a different strategy than a better-positioned challenger would have used.)"
http://lastmenandovermen.blogspot.com/2016/04/josh-voorhes-on-bernie-autopsy.html
In general this is true, it's always easy to second guess in hindsight. Usually, though, the reality is every choice of resource-allocation carries its own opportunity cost.
I agree with Sargent that had Bernie gone negative earlier it would have been counterproductive.
"Given how crucial that broader story-line has been to Sanders’s candidacy — that our political system and media are dithering while the middle class, our democracy, and our planet are facing quasi-existential threats from creeping oligarchy and climate change — it might have been difficult for him to prosecute a case against Clinton’s email arrangement. For many Dems the media obsession with it had already become a symbol of the dysfunctional, frivolous Beltway political culture Sanders is running against."
"The idea that Sanders didn’t attack Clinton hard enough over her Wall Street speeches also deserves some skepticism. The Sanders campaign aired an ad implicitly hitting Clinton over the speeches as early as the end of January, before the very first voting in the Iowa caucuses. What’s more, Sanders’s criticism of Clinton over Wall Street money has long been problematic for him, too, because it shed light back on to a tension within his own candidacy. Sanders has offered up a critique of our broader system as corrupt and in thrall to big money interests, which has had the salutary effect of forcing the topic squarely on to the Democratic agenda. But his campaign has sometimes seemed to equivocate on whether it wants to be seen implying that Clinton herself is bought and paid for, or at least that her policy positions are the direct result of donations to her campaign. One charitable interpretation is that Sanders has been uncomfortable with this latter implication, but that he and his campaign have at times succumbed to the temptation to indulge in it, because, after all, he’s trying to defeat her."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/04/04/no-bernie-sanders-shouldnt-have-attacked-hillary-clinton-harder/
What's ironic, is that Bernie himself initially hadn't wanted to attack her on her paid speeches, arguing quite rightly that she has a right to make money.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/04/us/politics/bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton.html?_r=0
So why exactly does she no longer have the right to make money?
Again, I will argue that maybe his attacks on her speeches actually have hurt him. He is now negative 7 in his own approval rating.
This is the problem with correlation and causation. You never know what causes what. After he won Michigan, he assumed that this was thanks to hitting trade deals hard. But then the same strategy bore no fruit in Ohio as he also lost Missouri and Illinois.
The idea that going negative earlier would have helped him is a theory very much in doubt.
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