This part is true.
> There is a tendency, when we disagree with an election, to tally up the donations made to the other side while ignoring all the times the best-funded candidate got trounced. (Jeb!)
While this is too specific to a particular type of election to hold true in general (no pun intended). The POTUS election is almost by definition the most high profile election in the US, therefore the money does the least to boost your name recognition, as evidenced by $2B in "free" media publicity for the 2016 winner.
However, the WH is not the only race that matters. According to https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/money-and-elections-a-c... "For house seats, more than 90 percent of the candidates who spend the most win."
This article goes into great length to explain why correlation does not mean causation, but it also makes the case that a lot of the races that are indeed somewhat low-profile, and that's where money makes the big impact.