Obama on top form

FORMER PRESIDENT TAKES THINLY VEILED SWIPES AT TRUMP Calls for Americans to reject politics of division.

Former president Barack Obama, back on the campaign trail for the first time since he left the White House, called on voters to reject a growing “politics of division” that he said was corroding American democracy.

Without mentioning Republican President Donald Trump, Obama told rallies in New Jersey and Virginia that voters could send a powerful message about the type of politics they want by backing Democrats in November 7 elections in the two states.

“What we can’t have is the same old politics of division that we have seen so many times before,” Obama told a cheering crowd in Newark, New Jersey, that chanted: “Four more years.”

“Some of the politics we see now, we thought we put that to bed. That’s folks looking 50 years back,” Obama said.

At a stop in Richmond, Virginia, Obama said modern politics increasingly did not reflect basic American values of inclusiveness and were driving people away.

“We’ve got folks who are deliberately trying to make folks angry; to demonise people who have different ideas; to get the base all riled up because it provides a short-term tactical advantage.”

Many of Obama’s comments appeared to be thinly veiled swipes at Trump, whose combative style and inflammatory rhetoric have led to frequent controversy.

Obama made the remarks just hours after former president George W Bush also took a swing at Trump with a speech decrying “bullying and prejudice”, while defending immigrants. –

Picture: AFP A man holds a portrait of Santiago Maldonado, an activist who disappeared two months ago and whose body is thought to have been found two days ago. Maldonado, 27, was last seen being detained by paramilitary police.