$64B Punching Bag: Mike Bloomberg Learns The Hard Way Money Cannot Buy Experience

When former New York City mayor and billionaire Michael Bloomberg surged to a 19% lead in a national poll, behind Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., it did seem like his strategy to use the vast financial resources at his command to secure the Democratic nomination for the 2020 presidential election was working.

The media mogul has so far spent more than $400 million on ads, which helped him earn a place in Wednesday night's debates – despite him skipping the early nomination states of Iowa and New Hampshire. That approach seemed to hold great advantage. Till he stepped on stage for the Nevada debates – and the balloon popped.

It was optics at its worst for Bloomberg. Gone was the air of the confident billionaire who could snatch victory from Trump; the 77-year-old suddenly looked meek and defenseless, a silent punching bag in front of the brutal attack unleashed by his Democratic rivals.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., sunk her teeth in even as Bloomberg was delivering what sounded like a scripted reply to a question from the moderators: Does Bernie Sanders have a chance to win against President Donald Trump?

Warren delivered a knuckle sandwich of a characterization, barely giving Bloomberg time to finish his sentence: “A billionaire who calls women fat broads and horse-faced lesbians, and no I’m not talking about Donald Trump, I’m talking about Mayor Bloomberg,” she said. The audience cheered; Bloomberg stood by uncomfortably but offered up no response.

Bloomberg's personal wealth is estimated at $64 billion, which equals the total net worth of nearly 660,000 American households. Forbes estimated Donald Trump's net worth at $3.1 billion in 2018.

He even had what CNN called a "jaw-dropping response" when asked about gender discrimination and lawsuits against his company. The former mayor said none of the women who accused him have claimed him doing anything other than maybe not liking "a joke I told." The crowd booed.

Warren, and the others on stage, seized on that and continued to rain blows on the hapless billionaire. She asked if he would release the women who had accused him from their non-disclosure agreements. Bloomberg said "no," but could not offer a convincing reason.

Former Vice President Joe Biden found that the moment to get a punch in. “It’s easy. All the mayor has to do is say, you are released from the non-disclosure agreements, period,” Biden said.

Perhaps the best assessment of Bloomberg's performance came from President Trump, a master in despatching political rivals into irrelevance. He tweeted after the debate: "Mini Mike Bloomberg’s debate performance tonight was perhaps the worst in the history of debates, and there have been some really bad ones. He was stumbling, bumbling and grossly incompetent. If this doesn’t knock him out of the race, nothing will. Not so easy to do what I did!"

Reports said Bloomberg had practiced for the Nevada debate with a team of advisers -- for several weeks. CNN's Jeff Zeleny said citing reporters who have covered Bloomberg that the billionaire has held no town hall meetings, and that he delivered his speeches with the aid of a teleprompter.

That approach would have worked in a corporate setting but, at least for Bloomberg, it failed spectacularly in an election setting. What would have worked is perhaps the kind of experience he would have gained from campaigning in Iowa and New Hampshire, and tangling with fellow rivals in earlier Democratic debates.

Perhaps the former mayor’s tag line when he announced his candidacy could explain his listless performance: “I offer myself as a doer and a problem solver – not a talker.”

But debates do matter. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., for instance, was vaulted to the fifth place after the New Hampshire primaries after a strong debate performance; it also brought in about $3 million of campaign funds and new volunteers.

Bloomberg may not need the money; he can hire all the campaign staff he wants. But the experience needed to match wits with rivals on public stages, to take questions from the voters, cannot be bought, or gained from scripted settings with underlings.

If there is one lesson from Bloomberg’s massively underwhelming performance, it is this: Money cannot buy experience, debates can.

And if debates do matter, as was seen in Klobuchar's case, Bloomberg should be losing all that lead he has built up with his ads.