"Anybody but Hillary" was the slogan amongst many democrats during campaign. That's the opposite of popular.
"I can't think of a candidate more out of step with the country's populist mood"
With a Hillary Clinton candidacy looking weaker by the day, it's time for Democrats to consider other options
theweek.com
This article was written in March 2015 I think. I don’t remember who had already made announcement to run that early. However as you can see the tone of the article is arrogant. Sanders phenomenon of 2016 was not anywhere on the horizon.
If it was written in 2016 Hillary was already a front runner by then. Fair and square. It was becoming clearer that Trump was front runner on the Republican side to surprise of everyone including Trump himself.
In hindsight you can see why this opinion writer and his ilk were so wrong. People (Democrat voters) like him are the reason for very narrow win for Trump in 2016. The first two paragraphs of the article echo what I said. She was the most qualified candidate to have run for presidency.
The rest of the baggage of hers use to be a constant refrain of main press media. The Republican committee searched and investigated Benghazi for over two years and came up with nothing to pin Clinton on. The chair admitted it was a political witch hunt and strategy to weaken Clinton as a presidential candidate. The email scandal was much ado about nothing. If you know anything about technology, you would know that any one of Clinton’s age would hardly understand technicalities of someone setting up an email server. If know anything about 90s and 2000s politics in the USA, Hillary Clinton was second most hounded Democrat by Republicans. To survive that kind of attacks day in and day out can create certain kind of mentality. The most hounded was Bill Clinton ofcourse. And Hilllary Clinton was attributed guilty by association.
When you read that article today and look at what has gone since 2016 to 2020 and 2024 onwards, you will see how pathetic the follies ascribed to Clinton look in hindsight today. Btw what you read in that article was repeated very often during the 2015 election cycle.
In 2015, everyone expected to Clinton to win. Including Trump. There was no one on the Democratic side that would have got more votes than Clinton. Except if Obama could have run. Sanders and Warren would have lost badly. USA is not going to elect likes of Sanders and Warren even today.
My original rebuttal was your statement that she was “very unpopular”. The facts are:
1. She secured around 66 million total votes.
2. Until then only Obama had got more votes.
3. Which means she secured more votes than any other Presidential candidate in the USA history not named Obama. Let that sink in.
4. In most other democracies she would have been declared winner. It is quirk of the USA electoral system that she lost.
5. Clinton lost Michigan by margin of 10,700 votes which was 0.23% margin if I recall had she won the Michigan she would have been president. That is how close it was.
Factually you are wrong to say she was “very unpopular”.
Trump’s approval ratings have been one of the lowest of any President in both terms if I am not wrong. Only Truman, Nixon, Carter and Bush had lower approval rating than Trump (33%) in their worst polling years. Trump’s highest approval rating across two term stands at 49%. But Truman (87%), Nixon (67%), Carter (75%), Bush (90%) had peaks that blow away Trump. Nixon, who is considered most unpopular President in modern USA history handily beats Trump in peak popularity.