“Maybe Trump has decided that rather than one big flash, he’ll slowly up the ante day after day to keep the fire stoked.”
Maybe.
He’s a public relations genius when it comes to promoting himself. The question to ask is what is in this for Trump.
It's very simple: publicity & controversy. For a guy like Trump, any publicity is good publicity, and the more controversial he is, the more publicity he gets.
It's not like they guy cares about his credibility. He threw that away a long time ago.