> There tends to be a guilt by association that seems to happen often—where if you have opinion “A” (some standard conservative opinion on some subject not directly tied to racism) you must also have opinion “B” (some fringe race-oriented opinion sometimes found in conservative circles).

To be fair, U.S. conservatives are only reaping what they sow. The overtly racist wing of conservatism received such a drubbing after civil rights went through that they had to scale back the racist rhetoric and talk about social and economic policies that disadvantaged certain races, but appealed to traditional ideas about federalism and small government. So now whenever anyone talks about federalism and small government, it is assumed that there is a racist agenda lurking behind those appeals because historically, there was.