Trump broke all the rules to win the primary. He can't do the same against Hillary.

I don’t know if the Trump campaign actually employs only 70 people (in the same interview, Lewandowski also said Trump is leading in the polls among women and Hispanics, which suggests he was visiting from Bizarro World), but if that’s true, it’s nothing short of stunning. With that tiny number, there are many things you just couldn’t do; for instance, there would be no way to run a field operation mobilizing volunteers to make phone calls, knock on doors, and identify your voters so you can be sure they show up to the polls on election day. It’s just too labor-intensive. Trump has only one communications staffer, which would be a small number for a congressional campaign, let alone a presidential nominee. It’s one thing to be “lean” and not waste money, but Trump’s campaign sounds positively skeletal.

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Trump may be half-right in his apparent disdain for traditional campaign organization, in the sense that many of the things campaigns do require a lot of effort but produce effects only at the margins. The problem is that in a close race — and we’re in an era where every presidential race is going to be close — the margins matter a great deal. If your field operation can produce an extra point or two on election day, even if it required the tireless labor of hundreds of staffers and thousands of volunteers, that might be the difference between defeat and victory.

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