[This [by Jeffrey Feldman] is sharp.](https://www.facebook.com/jeffreyfeldman/posts/pfbid033GiqQAXPdZEq7AHs1sWmqRFtvrNoAQpL6SURbKot7jspoBVFWNWy2KshPQeFjzB3l?__cft__[0]=AZWJ6kLaofY1mR2ObR1VMuJyeFSfYGNzcMC0sqvyXMY1Ka_7JzUwYJTxHLtJ-Z_1sLwA2hHz6yGw4HuIenFR9VaOfrkfeHDcpkAIvOxOqcwgVg72wop5MiWDZLl6XwjDlAJhwZmNVKwhUtC4r53GDDvN75wGqrxphasb3iLEcL4ykbZeM3NRyJp7Dkrnh0a-rYw&__tn__=%2CO%2CP-y-R)
I think Yglesias has this analysis wrong. Here’s what he misses: Clinton is not just disliked for some abstract reason. She went out and actively made a key group hate her and her people. She alienated a key block that she now needs. She has not secured the Left that’s tipped to Stein. Clinton’s strategy with that part of the Left has been to shame them. It’s was a segment of the Sanders base. For months and months her campaign did it. They even hired people to do it under the guise of online commenting etc. They’re still doing it. The result is that a now significant percentage has left the party. She could have done something different. She could have gone after the Left—brought them into the fold, worked more in public with Sanders, etc. She made no moves in this direction. And now it’s probably too late. It will likely go down as a historic misjudgment on her part: believing it was still the 1980s and she could win by distancing herself from the McGovern wing. But it’s not the 1980s. She alienated one of the most active, nimble and contemporary segments of the big tent. Take them back and she is on top. The crucial part of the vote that doesn’t like her—she invested time and money into making them hate her more, instead of doing the opposite.
The race is tightening for a painfully simple reason by Matthew Yglesias
Sociological and psychological explanations of the skepticism about HRC ignore how aggressively her machine dismissed the left for most of this election — a classic Clintonian move. If the media coverage were rigorously fair and America were in a better place about gender, she’d still be unpopular and out of step with how the country has been changing across the political spectrum. And that’s the real problem, isn’t it? You can blame people for not being “with her,” but isn’t the point that she should be “with us”? America today is a cornucopia overflowing with opportunities for politicians to plunge in and try to channel populist discontent in better directions, but Clinton has been clinging to the crumbling middle.