If he's trying to start a race war he's doing a lousy job of it. He has almost half the country, both white and black, interested in him.

And since politics has become mind-bogglingly nasty in the last couple of decades he might be honestly expecting it and is trying to counter it preemptively.

He's just another politician, AFAIK, and he has every right to "swiftboat" his opposition by implying they're racists as they portrayed John Kerry as a coward and a liar.
This appears to me no more than the right whining about the same thing they themselves have done.

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Not a day goes by that I don't see something that reinforces my belief that people are idiots.