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Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks at a town hall-style campaign event at the former Osram Sylvania light bulb factory in Manchester, New Hampshire, last month. Brent Larkin writes that Trump's nomination in Cleveland is about to deliver a crushing blow to the Republican Party's credibility and legacy.

(Robert F. Bukaty, Associated Press, File)

CLEVELAND -- There are precious few Republicans Hillary Clinton can beat Nov. 8.

Truth is, there may be only one: the mean-spirited bigot the party of Lincoln is about to nominate for president.

As bad a candidate as Clinton is -- and the political baggage weighing on her candidacy is enormous -- Donald Trump is immeasurably worse.

I get the stuff about voter anger and frustration, but fascism isn't the answer.

It's been a wonderful spring and summer in downtown Cleveland -- a historic one, actually.

Now, on the way to their leap off the Election Day precipice, Trump and his lemmings are about to invade a city that might be better off without them.

Their mission: Deliver a crushing blow to the reputation of a political party that once had little or no tolerance for mind-numbing prejudice.

No matter what happens in the election, the 2016 Republican National Convention will be forever remembered as the year the party and its shockingly callow "leaders" awarded its presidential nomination to a man who constantly degrades women, minorities, the disabled, immigrants and, most recently, Jews.

Here to put their personal stamp of approval on the candidacy of a man who makes Clarabell seem like Churchill will be senators (including one from Ohio), congressmen (Ohio's dirty dozen), governors and other assorted political hacks and officeholders.

Their role will be to act as props in the sellout -- Trump's bootlickers.

They'll be in full I-support-the-ticket mode, permanently soiling their reputations in the process.

It's above my pay grade to crawl inside Donald Trump's mind to figure out exactly what's going on there as he prepares to finish off the Republican Party. But one needn't be a Harvard-trained shrink to wonder whether something isn't quite right.

Would a normal person react to the biggest mass shooting in the nation's history by taking credit for predicting it?

Is there anything remotely normal about someone who tries to connect President Barack Obama to the massacre of 49 people in Orlando, Florida; who suggests Bill and Hillary Clinton might have murdered Vince Foster; who links Sen. Ted Cruz's father to the assassination of President John F. Kennedy?

How about a man who unequivocally states that some U.S. soldiers in Iraq are crooks, then reminds us how much he loves veterans?

Since this frighteningly unfit man became a candidate for the world's most important job, rarely has a day gone by without his inviting psychological profiling.

That explains why Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, The Washington Post and other credible, mainstream media outlets have spoken with some of the nation's leading mental health professionals in an attempt to determine whether Trump suffers from some form of significant mental problem.

The diagnosis is beyond dispute:

Trump's narcissism, a personality disorder not uncommon among politicians, is as severe a case as some mental health professionals have ever seen.

Clinical psychologist and best-selling author Ben Michaelis told Vanity Fair that Trump clearly suffers from "textbook narcissistic personality disorder."

George Simon, a psychologist and expert on manipulative behavior, described Trump's narcissism to Vanity Fair this way: "He's so classic that I'm archiving video clips of him to use in workshops because there's no better example.... He's like a dream come true."

Narcissism is universally defined as a disorder that includes excessive self-love, a lack of empathy, a feeling of grandiosity and a sense of entitlement.

The Klan's candidate is a perfect fit.

Psychologists are notoriously reluctant to diagnose personality disorders from afar -- with good reason.

Cleveland Magazine stirred a controversy with a 1978 cover story about the city's young mayor entitled, "Kucinich on the Couch." In it, two local psychiatrists were asked to analyze Kucinich's excessively confrontational style.

Fourteen years earlier, Sen. Barry Goldwater successfully sued Fact Magazine for a piece that polled psychiatrists on his mental fitness to be president.

The poll was conducted in the midst of Goldwater's landslide loss to President Lyndon Johnson.

But the general reluctance of psychologists to weigh in on the mental stability of a politician makes the willingness of so many to talk about Trump all the more remarkable.

Clinical social worker Wendy Terrie Behary told Vanity Fair, "Narcissists are not necessarily liars, but they are notoriously uncomfortable with the truth. The truth means the potential to feel ashamed."

Shame and Trump have never met.

Harvard Professor Howard Gardner, a developmental psychologist, argues that the thought process of Trump's supporters might be an even more compelling subject for examination.

"They are unable or unwilling to make a connection between the challenges faced by any president and the knowledge and behavior of Donald Trump," Gardner said of Trump's Kool-Aid gulpers. "In a democracy, that is disastrous."

But it may not come to that.

Despite all the disgusting things you will watch and read about in the days ahead, the infatuation with this toxic combination of Joe McCarthy and George Wallace may not last.

In "The Mind of Donald Trump," the June cover story in The Atlantic, acclaimed Northwestern University psychologist Dan P. McAdams wrote: "But more often than not, narcissists wear out their welcome. Over time, people become annoyed, if not infuriated, by their self-centeredness. When narcissists begin to disappoint, their descent can be especially precipitous."

We can only hope the descent begins here.

It would be another historic moment -- one that makes it all worthwhile.

Brent Larkin was The Plain Dealer's editorial director from 1991 until his retirement in 2009.

To reach Brent Larkin: blarkin@cleveland.com