How Trump let himself get out-organized

Politico ^

[springwater13]

Trump's backers maintain that the most painful part of his loss to Cruz, by a 3.3-percentage-point margin, is that it never should have happened. Trump actually won the battle for supporters, they believe, especially among nontraditional Republican voters, but he lacked the tools to get them to participate in Iowa's Byzantine caucus system. As a result, a candidate who could have been vaulted into New Hampshire with huge momentum on top of an impressive polling lead is instead looking shrunken and chastened.

Trump's staff "got outclassed and outmaneuvered ― the Iowa team simply didn’t have the tools they needed, which is why they overpromised and underperformed," said a source close to the Trump campaign. "The Iowa team did an amazing job with the tools that they had, but that's like saying that Al Qaeda did an amazing job in a battle with the U.S. Army because some Al Qaeda fighters didn’t get killed."

At one point early in the campaign, Trump representatives talked to Cambridge Analytica ― the firm now being credited with engineering Cruz’s cutting-edge targeting operation ― about retaining the company’s services, but they decided it was too expensive.

The campaign's lackadaisical data effort is seen in some quarters as coming down to Trump's lack of willingness to use his own cash on something that's seen as essential in modern-day presidential politics. "Trump's a businessman," said Joe Rospars, who served as a chief digital strategist to President Barack Obama's 2008 and 2012 campaigns. "He's not going to spend any more money than he has to, and he made his bet."

[Berlin_Freeper]

Trump failed expectations of the HYPE.

If you don't believe me then post to the Trump supporter who started this thread...

I'm all in for Trump but I got to call it like I see it. Iowa was a winnable race for him but he decided to do it on the cheap and got burned. He didn't make the investments necessary to get out his vote.

[cabojoe]

I wonder if anyone got fired.

[grania]

I think a lot of people are trying real hard to read a lot more into Iowa than is actually there

I hear you, but I'd state it a little differently. There's a lot there, but because we're in unchartered territory, understanding it is difficult.

Trump promised us a different kind of campaign, an old style one where people went to rallies, got involved, had fun, had hope. It was about being given a choice, not about the psyops manipulation of modern campaigns.

Trump delivered. He also delivered hope for the future and the inspiration of being a person who has succeeded in life and in business on his own term. Instead of going to a debate, he raised $6 million for Veterans, and a lot of us feel real good because we're part of that accomplishment.

What happened? Some of that percent of loss was votes stolen by Cruz from Dr. Carson. No ones talking about that. Were some of these new voters in caucus bullied into voting with their neighbors? Perhaps it could've been won by Trump on the cheap, with one forceful personality in each caucus room to engage Trump supporters to stick together. Messing that up falls on his Iowa campaign, I'd think.

It also says a lot about Iowa voters, and what it says I hope isn't true for the whole nation. It's a form of Stockholm Syndrome to accept abuse. Well, what came out of Cruz's campaign from December on, with badgering for donations, Shamegate, tricking Dr. Carson's supporters, is voter abuse, and it didn't bother them enough. If folks are going to ignore things that indicate the same old stuff is going on, the US is going to hit rock bottom, fast.

Voting for Rubio, I understand, he didn't abuse and bully voters, and is an articulate and intelligent candidate.

Meanwhile, I look at what Mr. Trump accomplished, and say WOW!! He woke people up to care about politics, he provided wonderful venues where people bonded, he got all of us involved and raised a lot of money that will get to Veterans, he brought himself and his family to the world of average folk and bonded with real people (how many of the elite even know we exist?). People will look back and say Trump gave the nation a chance to save itself. It's up to US to do the rest, get him to DC for four years, and begin to clean up the mess!

(this is my daily pre-coffee, thoughts upon waking up rant. I hope I avoided word switches and typos that change meanings)

[GeronL]

Cruz won one more delegate than Trump and Rubio and this was in a state that was tailor made for him

All the pundits said Cruz had no real chance in Iowa, Trump led the polls for months. Cruz opposed ethanol, that was supposed to be a nail in the coffin.

But after the vote.... it was tailor-made... lol.

Cruz won because only 5% of caucus-goers said Trump shared their values.

[SmokingJoe]

Keep telling yourself that. Trump was beating Ted Cruz in the last 13 polls for Iowa, all in the last week. CNN and Fox polls had Cruz losing by a massive 11 points and Cruz still won, and not by a squeaker like Hilary Clinton, but by 4 points. That is pretty impressive need matter how you twist it.

[GeronL]

Voting for Rubio, I understand, he didn't abuse and bully voters, and is an articulate and intelligent candidate.

Except it now appears that Rubio was spreading the "Ben Carson dropping out" meme too.

[springwater13]

Honestly, I could never vote for Cruz. The fake televangelist victory speech made me sick. I was expecting him to start speaking in tongues. The man seems deranged with the Glenn Beck crowd. I could never support this lunacy.

I can live with Marco if things don’t work out for Trump. It’s not ideal and he does nothing to inspire me that things will change but we have to stop Hillary.

[RC one]

I honestly never expected Trump to Win Iowa. After Huckabee and Santorum, it’s clear what you have to do to win the Iowa republican caucus and Ted made sure to do just that. What remains to be see is how much that strategy pays off after Iowa.

[RC one]

Agree 100%. Plus I can’t vote for a non-NBC.

[grania]

Where is your verification that Rubio was spreading the rumor? I won’t be impressed if it’s something a few supporters picked up from the Cruz crowd or if it wasn’t a coordinated initiative.

[toddausauras]

He did great against a man seen as very, very religious for a politician. Iowa loves their overtly religious candidates, I have no problem with it. But if there’s one state that isn’t historically predictive of the GOP nominee it’s non other than IA.

[nathanbedford]

Trump lost because his ego got in the way. He chose to spend the money to raise crowds to cheer and exalt Donald Trump rather than to find out what the people of Iowa really wanted.

The man who is going to make great "deals," the man who says you should vote for him because he is the only man on earth who is "competent" to make deals with the Chinese, can't outthink an evangelical in the corn fields. We are in the twenty-first century and that evangelical in the corn fields won because he understands data mining while Donald Trump invested in red hats.

Donald Trump who says he knows how to find "fantastic" and "wonderful" people to negotiate with the Chinese, picked the wrong people to win in the corn fields.

Donald Trump's failure is not stinginess but ego! He will take that with him into the White House if you put him in there.

[SmokingJoe]

I never saw even a single Trumpbot here on FR say they expected Trump to lose in Iowa before Monday night that is. All we had was Trumpbots posting poll after poll after poll on the sidebar showing Trump with massive leads in Iowa and boasting about how Trump was going to steamroller Ted Cruz in Iowa.
Now of course, Trumpbots are singing a different tune.

[RC one]

I would have been surprised if he had won in Iowa. pleasently surprised.

[Chgogal]

Excuse me, how many delegates did Cruz win? How many delegates did Trump win? How many delegates are needed to win the nomination?

[SmokingJoe]

Why invest mega-bucks and practically LIVE in weird IOWA when IOWA’s delegates are NOT a winner take all?

Because the cutting edge analytical tools that Ted Cruz invested in and used so effectively in Iowa, is equally applicable to New Hampshire, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Kentucky etc. Ted Cruz already has a massive, top flight ground game in the southern states ready for the SEC primaries.

[SmokingJoe]

Iowa is not about delegates. It’s about momentum, perception, story lines, performance over and above(or below) expectations etc. Trump lost in every single one of those by performing way BELOW expectations. His aura of inevitability and invincibility has been broken for good.

[Chgogal]

No, the big picture - Accumulating enough Delegates to win the nomination.

Small picture is Iowa. You and I both know it.

Cruz's speech sucked. It was long and uninspiring. His vote on the TPP also sucked.

Right now I don't like anyone. But Trump got a lot of votes and did a hell of a lot better than ALL of the career politicians except for one. He lost to the shaming, lying Cruz.

[Yo-Yo]

Trump is a businessman and made a business decision. You tend to do that when you’re spending your own money. With the lead he has in New Hampshire, an outright win in Iowa wasn’t as desperately needed for Trump as it was for Cruz.

[Seeing More Clearly Now]

The instant I read that Sarah Palin endorsed him I knew his goose was cooked. He needed that like a hole in the head. She is a lightning rod that surely lost him a lot of previous supporters.