Of course, but was it malicious?

Keep in mind that it wasn't a photo from last year - it's from an awkward time where there was an overall incredible lack of sensitivity and general understanding of those sorts of issues. Many terms were used commonly without really understanding how offensive they were - like something disappointing being referred to as 'gay', or if someone did a foolish thing they could be called 'retarded' without a second thought. Blackface was always... questionable, but it didn't always have the same kind of hateful connotation as it does now. I can't believe that it was done with malicious intent on his part.

There was a lot of ignorance of just how offensive many things in popular culture at the time actually were. You can often see some of these awkward situations and terminology come up in media from that time.