So I guess Clinton and the DNC contributed nothing to this loss.

[JHan]

12. So who is arguing that?

1) August was a critical month for the Clinton Camp - they dropped the ball.

2) They should have prepared for this year being the first year without Voting Rights Act in place and mobilized the Carolinas and other Southern States - they dropped the ball again.

3) A targeted campaign to retake the house should have started way back in 2013 and hooked onto the eventual Nominee. We had a 30 seat deficit ( this should have been the focus)

4) The DNC should not have played favorites I suppose - but Bernie also should not have barged into the party at the last minute demanding change and demanding the Democrats change their platform to suit his agenda. Joining the partya year before an election and using it as a vehicle for your political ambitions - when did he pay his dues like everybody else? You don't do that, you don't EVER do that. That is a poor strategy and it divided the party. A party divided cannot stand.

5) There needed to be a cohesive counter argument to the nonsense populism coming out of Trump's piehole - unfortunately some of it was also coming out of Bernie's piehole.

-- And I don't know why you're dismissive about the impact of the other things..

1) the BenGhazi witch hunt had an effect, Hillary's favorability ratings was sailing high two years ago.
2)the bullshit email scandal had an effect - it should piss off every democrat that one of our stalwarts was hounded over this
3)the leak of hacked private correspondence between private citizens running a political campaign had an effect, it reinforced in people's mind the attacks against Hillary of her being a "liar" and "corrupt" , even though the the contents of the emails aren't all that shocking. Worse yet her nuanced positions on energy, trade and politics was truncated and spun into damaging soundbytes -
4) FBI bullshit from Comey. Hillary was on a strong upward trajectory before Comey's letter hit, she was outside the margin of error. The letter and the poor reporting of it, and a week of suspect leaks from the FBI from agents with an agenda, talk about Hillary being indicted, affected the momentum of her campaign. It was a week of total bullshit. After Trump heralding the FBI for "Finally doing their job" , Comey's second letter reinforced in the mind of his supporters the myth that the FBI is rigged in Hillary's favor and they came out to vote.
5) Russian interference - which should PISS OFF EVERY AMERICAN ( see point 3)