He may brand himself as a cold-blooded businessman, but Trump is comically incapable of hiding how he really feels. He has responded to his loss in Iowa with several distinct phases, starting with stunned silence, then moving on to bitter petulance, before settling on a whole lot of excuse-making. “Don’t forget, Joe: I’m doing this for the first time,” he told Joe Scarborough. “I’m like a rookie.” He added that he “was told always that I could not do well in Iowa. I was told, don’t go to Iowa.” Furthermore, he basically has no idea what certain words mean. “Well, I think we could have used a ground game, a term I wasn’t even familiar with,” he said. “You know, when you say ground game, I say what the hell is that?”
It’s true, Trump with an actual ground game would have been formidable. But barring that, you have to communicate your disadvantages in a way that benefits your campaign. In other words, you make excuses before the vote, not after. And it looks like Trump is starting to get that.