If I had to guess, Putin wants to sow internal division, discord, and distrust. If I had to say, Putin is a grandmaster of misinformation and misdirection. See his non-answer answers to Chris Wallace's probing interview questions. So, he sees how Trump's presidency sows discord, and Trump's opposition plays right along, probably much to his delight. (This includes their obsessing for years about Trump/Putin-collusion conspiracy theories.) He most likely seeded the claims made in the so-called Steele dossier (actually the Clinton/PerkinsCoie/FusionGPS/Simpson/Steele dossier), and the anti-Trump-biased intelligence (sic) community played right along, further sowing distrust of its honor and capabilities.
Now we hear that he might also like to see Sanders be president (consider the ring to that phrase - "President Sanders" - and in light of this) if he can't have Trump; for that, too, would sow much division for obvious reasons. He sees Sanders' quasi-rabid supporters, and parallels to Trump's True Believers, and figures they'll be adequate to the division-sowing job. Then again, maybe it's just another piece of misinformation from him that he wants Sanders elected, maybe just to see how Americans react to that notion.
We just don't really know for sure what's a trial balloon from him, and what's for real. 'Reality' for Vladimir Putin seems like a rather fluid notion, in a political context anyway, since the norms of rationality touted (and practiced to varying degrees of imperfection) by philosophers and scientists are not the norms (if they can even be called that) of political discourse (warring by less violent means). His state-TV apparatus is self-serving propaganda/lies, after all. He learned it at the KGB, ffs.
Knowing all this, why on earth should anyone pay serious attention to who Putin supposedly wants to win in the USA, or whether he even thinks discord and distrust in the USA serves his own political interests or not, and focus instead on the merits of each candidacy? It's just a distraction, which for all we know is what he wants. I mean, does he want more attention/scrutiny focused on him and his fundamentally dishonest and gangsterish nature, or not?
But what should really humble Trump's opponents is the thought that they may very well be willing if not eager dupes of Putin's puppet-mastery. But I don't expect such a level of thoughtfulness from them, at this point, they are that pathetic and dishonest themselves. Also, Trump as a matter of basic honesty and accountability/transparency should make clear to Putin that he wants him to stay away from election-meddling efforts. But Trump likes to troll his domestic opponents too much (and they're pathetic enough to go right along with that, as well), so I don't expect that from him, either.
Did I mention there's an antidote to this shitshow?
