Can we put it to rest that Hillary was a "bad candidate"

[Sparko55]

220. Actually NO

Supported Hillary in the general election, and would vote for her again. Remember her from back in the 1992 campaign when I worked on the Clinton campaign in Ohio, and Hillary did an appearance (sans Bill) at a Light up the Night on Public Square in Cleveland. In what was a largely unscripted speech she knocked it out of the ball park, and remember writing a friend in Minnesota and saying - "I think we have the wrong Clinton at the top of the ticket". She was unleashed, unscripted, and spoke from the heart and it was memorable.

Come forward to 2016, and living in Wisconsin and after the May primary which she lost 56% to 43% and 136,000 votes - Hillary was never seen or heard from again in Wisconsin. DT was all over the state many times - 6 to be exact. I don't know what Robbie Mook was thinking - Wisconsin was in the bag, because apart from Obama the state was closely contest with Gore winning in 2000 by a scant 5708 votes over GWB and Kerry winning in 2004 by 11,384. People in Wisconsin like their retail politics. It's why Tammy Baldwin won in 2012 when she beat 4 times former governor Tommy Thompson - she got to more counties and knew the terrain.

So, NO, you can't put to rest that Hillary was a "bad candidate". There were so many missteps in the campaign it's hard to tally them all. And picking Tim Kaine was the first huge misstep. You saw it coming in 2015 when at the Wisconsin Democratic State Convention in Milwaukee, all the speakers from Tammy Baldwin to Russ Feingold and Congressmen and Congresswoman, spoke against the TPP, and who shows up as the tin-ear of the convention Tim Kaine pro TPP advocate. If the party ever had been out of step with the electorate this was a warning. That and Bernie who's campaign was nascent garnered 42% support in the straw poll - the rank and file were sending a message that Chris Cillizza panned, but turned out to presage the prairie fire

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/06/08/hillary-clinton-only-beat-bernie-sanders-by-8-points-in-a-straw-poll-so/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.39686363dad2

So, when Hillary lost the next May losing 71 of 72 counties in perhaps the biggest ballot box route of the primary season - it was like, I'll never go back to Wisconsin - and she didn't - and she lost.

Where has the Democratic Party been shoring up the voting suppression effects of the GOP, helping people get registered, helping people get ID's as may be required. Actually, in many states they've been MIA.

Hillary should have had a 50 state strategy - she didn't. She had a 270 vote strategy and little fallback. DT took a shot gun approach and won - yes with far less votes - but with what mattered - electoral votes. Fair? I don't think so, but it's the system we are consigned to unless we change it. Disproportionate - for sure - given that California with more population than 22 states gets 2 Senators and the other 22 have 44 - so much to equality of votes. But, to say that the HRC campaign was top notch belies the gaps in spending time carelessly, and always pandering for more money in California while the fort was burning in Wisconsin.