Why did Clinton lose the initiative, again? [View all]

[Recursion]

This happened in 2008, too.

I was thinking about Paul Waldman's WaPo piece, and it keeps hitting home.

Either of those stories might be true. But right now, the Clinton campaign has a much bigger problem than the story it wants to tell about New Hampshire. That problem is this: the campaign has no story to tell the voters about Hillary Clinton and why she should be president.

Having a good story doesn’t guarantee you victory, but nobody becomes president without one. The story has to contain three simple elements. First, it explains what the problem is. Second, it explains what the solution is. And third, it explains why this candidate, and only this candidate, is the person who can bring the country from where it is now to where it ought to be.

I can make that sentence about all the other candidates (except Jeb!, oddly enough), from their campaigns:

Sanders: The 1% need to be taken down a notch
O'Malley: We need incremental evidence-based changes in healthcare and criminal justice (hey, it's not inspiring but it's honest)
Cruz: Godless liberal masses are threatening the Bible and the Constitution
Rubio: Washington is stuck in the 20th century; we need to modernize conservative government
Trump: America isn't as white as it used to be, and we should fix that
Carson: Those eggheads need to be taken down a notch
Kasich: Americans need to feel connections to each other again
Fiorina: Washington is too afraid of change; we need leaders who are transformative

What I can't tell you is why Clinton is running. What I get from her campaign is "I'm experienced" (which, frustratingly, gets the whole exercise exactly backwards by being about the past -- nobody cares).

She has since refined that to "I would be a better President". That's an improvement, I grant -- and for that matter I actually agree that she would, but that's not a message you win on, and the fact that the campaign thought that "I'm experienced" was an effective equivalent worries the hell out of me. When you look at the list I came up with above, you see a series of problems to which the candidates are offering solutions. The problems may be bullshit, and the solutions may be worse, but they actually engage voters (and Kasich's message is why I think he's the most dangerous on the R side: that is a powerful message if he manages to connect feelings of alienation to growth of government). They give the voter a reason to care about the campaign.

More to the original point, they allow the campaign to do something other than respond. Clinton started with unprecedented poll numbers and institutional support and still couldn't get Sanders to respond to her like she has to him.