Sanders' record of disrespecting female candidates should not be ignored

Clinton believes Warren's version of events.

"It's part of a pattern," Clinton said in the documentary. "If it were a one-off, you might say, 'OK, fine.' But he said I was unqualified. I had a lot more experience than he did and got a lot more done than he had, but that was his attack on me."

The word "unqualified" is a tell. So is the fact that, while insisting that a woman can be elected president, Sanders notes that Clinton got more votes than Donald Trump in the general election. Yet Sanders' ego won't let him add that she also got more votes than him in the Democratic primary.

This is something that Clinton has not forgotten. She reminded the interviewer that she got "more votes both in the primary, by about 4 million, and in the general election, by about 3 million."

Clinton also warned that voters in the current Democratic primary should not "reward the kind of insulting, attacking, demeaning, degrading behavior that we've seen from this current administration."

The 2016 nominee obviously thinks Democrats should focus on defeating Trump, not producing their own version.

Born in 1941, Sanders didn't grow up seeing women accomplish much outside the home. For most of his life, prejudice and discrimination kept many women out of many professions. In the 1970s, when he was in his 30s, the women's rights movement started to change things. Affirmative action programs helped bring white women to the table, and white men had to make room -- often reluctantly. And we're supposed to believe that, from all this life experience, Sanders somehow emerged as a feminist ally? Not likely.

Perhaps Sanders does support women -- as long as they're not vying for something he wants, like the presidency. From the looks of it, Sanders is no ally for women. Rather, the 78-year-old is a relic of an earlier time that we should not be so eager to revisit.

That's what Clinton and Warren are trying to tell us. We ought to listen.

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Ruben Navarrette's email address is ruben@rubennavarrette.com. His daily podcast, "Navarrette Nation," is available through every podcast app.