<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>paganel</author><text>Because the Democrats don’t want to hear that they lost because they chose Hillary to run instead of almost anyone else. That “it’s her turn now” was complete BS that messed up things even for us people who have never set foot in the States. I can see the Democrats making the same mistake again with Michelle Obama in 4 years’ time if they don’t win this round, I only hope she’ll be smart enough to stay out of it. On the other side of the aisle the Republican base was smart enough to send Jeb Bush swinging early on during the primaries, that’s why they now hold the Presidency.</text><parent_chain><item><author>rossdavidh</author><text>While I agree with &amp;quot;how malleable opinions are...&amp;quot;, the actual answer is, &amp;quot;not very malleable&amp;quot;.  Every well-designed study of political advertising I&amp;#x27;ve ever seen has shown that it&amp;#x27;s impact is very small, in some cases unmeasurably small.  Thus, for example, the 2016 Clinton campaign raised a lot more $$ than the Trump campaign, whereas the Sanders primary campaign out-fundraised the Clinton one.&lt;p&gt;Now, the impact on the politicians of fundraising, is not at all small.  The primary advantage of personalized advertising and fundraising, is to help a campaign rake in more cash, which is both legalized bribery, and an incentive to stoke your base&amp;#x27;s outrate instead of reaching towards the middle.&lt;p&gt;The worst thing about the CA&amp;#x2F;Facebook scandal, is that it&amp;#x27;s become an excuse for a large swath of the Democratic party to decide that it didn&amp;#x27;t make any mistakes in 2016 worth mentioning (or correcting).</text></item><item><author>shadowgovt</author><text>Probably the most useful takeaway from CA&amp;#x27;s approach is that it&amp;#x27;s useful to realize how malleable opinions are of large swaths of &amp;quot;independent&amp;quot; voters. Ad experts and entertainment companies have known this for decades, but I get the sense the average American citizen still thinks of themselves as a free and independent thinker and not a product of their environment.&lt;p&gt;Problem is, even if they are a free and independent thinker, voting populations are large enough that the &amp;quot;average is the outcome&amp;quot; phenomenon comes into play, and voters are on average demonstrably vulnerable to coercion. Not enough to flip people&amp;#x27;s opinions 180 degrees, but enough to, say, get a reality TV star elected over a politician with a checkered history (that has itself been subject to decades of effort and millions spent to make said history checkered).</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>New Cambridge Analytica Leaks</title><url>https://techcrunch.com/2020/01/06/facebook-data-misuse-and-voter-manipulation-back-in-the-frame-with-latest-cambridge-analytica-leaks/</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>shadowgovt</author><text>Correct. A study I&amp;#x27;ve heard described (apologies for missing a link directly to it right now) attempted to micro-target advertising to nudge numbers, and found the strategy that worked wasn&amp;#x27;t to tell &amp;quot;dyed-in-the-wool&amp;quot; supporters of a candidate to vote for the other candidate; it was to tell them their vote didn&amp;#x27;t matter and they should stay home. It appeared to have effect.</text><parent_chain><item><author>rossdavidh</author><text>While I agree with &amp;quot;how malleable opinions are...&amp;quot;, the actual answer is, &amp;quot;not very malleable&amp;quot;.  Every well-designed study of political advertising I&amp;#x27;ve ever seen has shown that it&amp;#x27;s impact is very small, in some cases unmeasurably small.  Thus, for example, the 2016 Clinton campaign raised a lot more $$ than the Trump campaign, whereas the Sanders primary campaign out-fundraised the Clinton one.&lt;p&gt;Now, the impact on the politicians of fundraising, is not at all small.  The primary advantage of personalized advertising and fundraising, is to help a campaign rake in more cash, which is both legalized bribery, and an incentive to stoke your base&amp;#x27;s outrate instead of reaching towards the middle.&lt;p&gt;The worst thing about the CA&amp;#x2F;Facebook scandal, is that it&amp;#x27;s become an excuse for a large swath of the Democratic party to decide that it didn&amp;#x27;t make any mistakes in 2016 worth mentioning (or correcting).</text></item><item><author>shadowgovt</author><text>Probably the most useful takeaway from CA&amp;#x27;s approach is that it&amp;#x27;s useful to realize how malleable opinions are of large swaths of &amp;quot;independent&amp;quot; voters. Ad experts and entertainment companies have known this for decades, but I get the sense the average American citizen still thinks of themselves as a free and independent thinker and not a product of their environment.&lt;p&gt;Problem is, even if they are a free and independent thinker, voting populations are large enough that the &amp;quot;average is the outcome&amp;quot; phenomenon comes into play, and voters are on average demonstrably vulnerable to coercion. Not enough to flip people&amp;#x27;s opinions 180 degrees, but enough to, say, get a reality TV star elected over a politician with a checkered history (that has itself been subject to decades of effort and millions spent to make said history checkered).</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>New Cambridge Analytica Leaks</title><url>https://techcrunch.com/2020/01/06/facebook-data-misuse-and-voter-manipulation-back-in-the-frame-with-latest-cambridge-analytica-leaks/</url></story>