I’m astounded that anyone who has been paying any attention to our toxic partisan politics in the last decade would think that the Republican attacks would be somehow less vehement for one candidate over the other. Eight years ago, I remember how Obama partisans would point out how “divisive” and “polarizing” Hillary Clinton would be as POTUS. Even then, the perpetual rage machine from right-wing talk radio and Fox News was completely disconnected from facts and logic, and I predicted pretty much what happened: If Obama was elected, the narrative and outrage from the right would be just as vigorous.
 
So, from their perspective, we’ve already had a Marxist/Leninist/Maoist/Islamic/Fascist Kenyan in the White House these last 7 years. Sanders breaks no new ground there. Besides which, I have found many Republicans who actually like him. The rage machine will blare, but I suspect many people will like this FDR, old school Americana candidate.
 
And far from being in a bubble, Sanders supporters (and nervous sympathizers) are a very big swath of the public whose economic conditions have diminished steadily over the last 10-20 years, with no hope in sight. I live in Aurora, Illinois, I was canvassing in Clinton, Iowa for Sanders. Both are cities devastated by neo-liberal trade deals and tax policies championed by both Clintons over the years, and whose largely blue-collar workforce have responded to the FDR type rhetoric that Sanders has the guts to promote - and a sense of his basic honesty.
 
Sanders will fight this campaign straight to the convention… his defiance of the echo-chamber punditry and conventional political wisdom, and his expected success, comes from a deep desire to change the system. Clinton just wants to be president. It’s the “We” of the Sanders’ campaign vs. the “I” of the Clinton campaign that is the heart of this phenomenon.