Clinton's Loss to Sanders Exposes Weakness of Message—and Messenger

[Red Oak]

"The Vermont senator beat Clinton in much the same way Barack Obama beat her nationwide in 2008."

"Sanders won across most demographic groups, coming in ahead of Clinton with women as well as men, those without and with college degrees, moderates as well as liberals, and income groups earning under $200,000 a year, according to a New York Times analysis of exit polls. Preferences broke along age lines, with Sanders winning the support of voters under 45, Clinton winning the support of voters 65 and older and the two dividing the voters in between."

Margaret Talev
Jennifer Epstein

Bloomberg Politics
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-02-10/clinton-s-loss-to-sanders-exposes-weakness-of-message-and-messenger

[Orsino]

1. "Weak" is a slightly odd word for a message that got her 38%...

...but okay. If winning consists of reputation + message, I'll buy that the greatest weakness is in the latter.

I just haven't figured out why the NH and IA results were so different, unless proximity to VT was key.

[Avalux]

2. Not proximity. Shaming of women, transcripts, trying to sound like Bernie....

There was a lot that happened in between IA and NH by Hillary's own hand that caused a negative backlash for her. She's the weakness; she lost the authenticity argument with the American people and nothing she does can get it back. It's almost impossible to make someone believe you after you've lost their trust. Any prefabricated attempts to change how people perceive Hillary will backfire.

[Orsino]

3. I don't recall any sudden turnaround in polling since Iowa.

I think the landscape's different in NH for some arcane mix of factors. I would certainly hope that all things you mentioned count.

[Fumesucker]

5. Polling hasn't been all that great with respect to accuracy

I think the political landscape is shifting, I subscribe to the plate tectonics theory of politics, the plates move culturally and the pressures build up until a sudden jump at the interface results in a political earthquake, the longer the period between jumps the greater the pressure and the greater the resulting earthquake.

[Avalux]

6. I hope so too.

All I can say is that social media was going nuts over Hillary's blunders (I have three millenial daughters who let me know). That sort of thing spreads like wildfire, quickly. This definitely helped Bernie win the total woman vote in NH. It will be interesting to see what happens next, if these things continue to be a factor.

But I can look at this a different way too. Maybe Hillary isn't much of a factor at all in Bernie's success. Maybe his message is resonating so strong that he's just going to keep gaining momentum. At this point I'm not sure what's going on, but I am feeling really good about it!

[Orsino]

7. Yeah. We may not be entitled to extrapolate a trend from NH...

...but I think a handy victory in a private are contest begins to establish Sanders in the mind as a viable nominee. That's more important as this point, I think, than any particular number of delegates.

[Senator Tankerbell]

4. I think Sanders win demonstrates the strength of his message.

And the strength of Sanders as a messenger.

Hillary is actually a pretty good politician. Sanders is just better.

[Ichingcarpenter]

8. This is not photoshopped

But I think he did put it on after being screened as a back drop. OR maybe not, maybe it is the new slogan