She had an enormous base of support and a rabid following for decades. She’s at least as likeable as Donald Trump.
The DNC is to blame for pushing an unlikable, unpopular candidate
The DNC does what the donors tell them. And Hillary commanded one of the most successful donor-bundling operations in the party’s history. In no small part because so many people liked her.
They’d rather lose with Hillary, than win with Bernie
That’s true. But Bernie also had a huge hurdle of likeability to overcome. He had at least as many dings on his score card, being an East Coast Jewish Man who once said nice things about Fidel Castro. Dude was DOA in Florida on that resume alone.
Where Hillary fucked up (and where Bernie had a lot of potential) was in the Midwest. And all that is thanks to NAFTA. The Democratic Party is still wrestling with the ghost of 1993 and Bill’s decision to move ahead with NAFTA after campaigning against it. Obama fucked Hillary horribly when he pushed ahead with the TPP, which dredged up all those skeletons and gave everyone in the Midwest flash-backs to the de-industrialization of the prior decade.
Trump was able to campaign on “America First” against a Democratic Party that is far too in-bed with international business interests to say anything in defense of domestic labor. Bernie could have countered that, which is the main reason why he was the preferred candidate against Trump.
But then, four years later, Joe Biden takes the stage and makes all the same “pro-labor” noises that Bernie is making. Plus COVID. Plus liberals being too terrified of Trump to contemplate anyone but the safest of safe bets.