If you can’t beat ’em, destroy democracy in the process.

That seems to be the attitude of the Trump campaign as it slouches toward the final days of Campaign 2016.

“We have three major voter suppression operations under way,” a senior Trump official told Bloomberg News.

They’re aimed at three groups Clinton needs to win overwhelmingly: idealistic white liberals, young women, and African Americans. Trump’s invocation at the debate of Clinton’s WikiLeaks e-mails and support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership was designed to turn off Sanders supporters. The parade of women who say they were sexually assaulted by Bill Clinton and harassed or threatened by Hillary is meant to undermine her appeal to young women. And her 1996 suggestion that some African American males are “super predators” is the basis of a below-the-radar effort to discourage infrequent black voters from showing up at the polls—particularly in Florida.

That’s the ticket. Make people so sick of the very process of selecting its leaders that they turn away in disgust. Does Trump hope this effort will put him over the top? Of course not. It’s all about ensuring that Trump remains a viable political and media force after what may be a defeat of historic proportions.

It shows a nearly unbelievable contempt for the American voter and the political process. Not that voter suppression is anything new. But bragging about it to a reporter from Bloomberg? It’s akin to saying that you are going to shoot a puppy, nothing will stop you from shooting the puppy, the puppy is doomed, and just think of all the attention we’ll get from shooting the puppy.

It seems clear that Donald Trump sees America as just another corporation to be raided, picked to the bone and ultimately discarded.

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