Why did O'Malley do so poorly during the debates?

[JCanete]

45. big ideas are only possible if you have the people behind them. They are never possible if you

don't actually push any forward. The specifics seem largely beyond the point, since moderate policy is as unlikely in our government as major policy. Spend all the time in the world writing the perfect legislation that does the right amount of pocket padding of the right companies in order to get that little bit of good change through, and you can be damned sure that you wasted your breath come time to actually get it enacted. There is no such thing as reaching across the aisle.

Clinton offered up just about nothing to get people fired up about. She basically wanted to give us the impression that we were in good hands, don't worry our pretty heads, she's got us. She was going to wonk us into the future with little tweaks here and there...you know, shit we couldn't possibly understand, but rest assured the adults were going to be at the table.

Again, if she wasn't rallying the people behind the change she was bringing, she wasn't bringing change, because you can't do it from the inside alone, even if you get inside.

I have great respect for Obama, and great respect for Hillary Clinton as well, but what big ideas? On message, thank GOD we had him for 8 years. He made us a kinder more thoughtful, more compassionate nation...at least in tone. And we got the ACA ...with the unspoken blessing of the insurance companies. Don't get me wrong, I'm bullish on it as a starting point, assuming the negatives of it didn't poison the well for too many people, but as to ideas, Clinton and Obama are fairly moderate.They are for working within a system its way, not changing the system. With that approach, it doesn't matter how many steps they help us to take forward, we're at a point of corporate control that we will always take twice as many backwards