Bernie did worse to Hillary than what Nader did to Al Gore

[Virginiá]

I do think Sanders damaged her quite a bit with Millennials, but she is not entitled to no primary challenger. I'm not glossing over this - Hillary has way too many problems. It's not even about whether her problems are valid, made up, or whatever. They exist in peoples minds, and it's hobbled her campaign a good bit.

Millennials don't trust or like her now. Sanders did hurt a lot, but it's possible these things would have hurt her later on anyway. Impossible to say now. Regardless of what Bernie did or didn't do, Hillary went into this campaign with a lot of baggage and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't very annoyed that her constant problems have become the only thing the media talks about when they aren't talking about Trump.

[Virginiá]

If Hillary had not married her Yale Law classmate, William Jefferson Clinton, she would not have been elected dogcatcher.

How would you even know that though? Her time as First Lady seems to be widely regarded as having shifted her to being far more guarded and untrusting of the media, this period certainly didn't do wonders for her image.

Point being that she would be a different person if she never married Bill.  They got married in 1975, when she was 28, so there would be serious differences. I just don't think anyone can know what she could accomplish (politically) or how she would be perceived given such a large change like that.

[Virginiá]

This. If she has trouble with beating a 72 year old socialist, how can Hillary supporters expect her to be treated with kiddie gloves by a protectionist orangutan.

What does being a 75** (74 at the time) year old democratic socialist (though he seems far more a social democrat) have to do with anything? His candidacy made it pretty clear that things have changed since the Cold War, and that many probably understood the distinction between socialism and just being a social democrat, something I don't get why is still being argued. They are not the same things.

[Virginiá]

Hillary is a smart talented hard working woman; no doubt. She would have been extremely successful regardless of who she married, but she lacks any sort of political charisma or talent. To think that she would be in this position politically without Bill, is a huge stretch.

I'm not saying she would still be the Democratic nominee in a presidential race (who knows), but you said she wouldn't even be elected dogcatcher. I just don't think that is true at all and really not something anyone could know for sure. She could have just as easily ended up as a Senator after working her way up over many years. People have held such offices with far less experience and effort.

[Virginiá]

Does no one on this forum think to question why people are against supporting Clinton? Around 65% percent of the country thinks she's dishonest, I doubt it's because of the voters.

No, I understand. I think it's undeniable at this point that the email stuff had a big impact on her image, despite it being a really petty and inconsequential faux-scandal. Same with Benghazi, which was a completely manufactured "scandal" that her haters don't even seem to understand. It's like they think she was personally responsible for all of it and got them killed, which is ludicrous.

Or the Clinton Foundation, an A+ charity that has done incredible work, and yet people associate with her corruption despite them not really knowing much but media talking points. Do people really think she was engaged in Nixon-level corruption just to solicit money for overseas charity work? Really?

You know what I agree with completely though is that Clinton is absolutely tone-deaf to how the things she does comes off to people, and she constantly creates this situations that come back to haunt her. She should have cut ties with the foundation when taking SoS, not had a private email server and more recently, should have just told people she had pneumonia right away. She has a big problem with trying to hide things and it always seems to cause her more problems, yet she never learns. I don't think she is really malicious with her secrecy, but it comes off that way.

So what I am saying is that I think the common reasons people cite as evidence she is corrupt are complete bs, but with her behavior in general, it's not surprising why they think that.

[Virginiá]

But Benghazi had no impact on obama, the reason why LEFT-wingers feel that way about Hillary now, is because of bernie justifying some of those right-wing narratives about hillary to left-wingers. Towards the end, Jane was even talking about the 'FBI hurrying up that investigation', and long before that he was hammering her on her corruption related to goldman sachs, etc. (not so much the foundation), those types of personal attacks are the exact same manner in which Nader damaged Gore. Not about real corruption, but about her being a 'puppet of the special interests', 'puppet of the 1%', 'an unqualified corporate democratic whore', etc.

Look, no offense, but I think you're seeing what you want to see here. Jane's comments were harmless in the grand scheme of things. Sanders was laser-focused on the Wall St speeches and Super PAC stuff, not emails or benghazi or any of that. I agree that Sanders damaged her with the constant mentioning of the speeches/campaign donation contrasts, and he needlessly continued damaging her even when it became clear he wouldn't win.. but again, this is how primaries are. Had it been someone other than Sanders, I'd feel confident saying they would have been much more savage.

This isn't all Bernie's fault, and I'm saying this as someone who voted for Clinton in the primaries. It's not fair to scapegoat him for all of Clinton's woes.