Rove & Company: You Know, We Could Help This Trump Guy Win I hope everyone who's backing Donald Trump because "he'll stand up to that rotten GOP Establishment like Karl Rove" takes a good look at this story: The super PAC conceived by Rove is suggesting to its donors that it can help Trump win the White House and save Republican senators whose reelection bids could be jeopardized by having Trump at the top of the ticket. The apparent warming of the American Crossroads super PAC and its sister groups to Trump has become evident in its recent communications with donors, including a Tuesday afternoon "investor conference call," according to multiple sources familiar with the outreach. The phone call -- which featured Rove, Crossroads officials and a pollster -- laid out swing state polling and electoral map analysis done by the group showing circumstances in which Trump could beat Clinton, the Democratic presidential front-runner, in a general election, according to three sources briefed on the call. One source, a high-level operative with the Koch brothers' conservative advocacy network, characterized the conversation as heralding "a softening of the anti-Trump position" within the big-money GOP establishment. The source added of Crossroads' stance on Trump, "It's not that they support him, only that if he's the guy, we can do something to stop Hillary." That was Tuesday. On Wednesday, Rove was in Utah, telling an audience, "[Trump's] lack of knowledge about what needs to be done and how it ought to be done is simply jaw-dropping. He just doesn't know what the heck to do." What polling is Rove seeing that the rest of us aren't? Back in December, Rove wrote in his Wall Street Journal column that Trump would get "creamed" and that he would represent Hillary Clinton's "dream candidate." Trump's polling has only gotten worse since Rove wrote those words. Right now, every national poll's outlook for a Trump–Hillary matchup is a Democratic landslide. Twenty polls have looked at that potential matchup since the beginning of the year. Trump led two. This morning, yet another national poll: Trump's seen unfavorably by 67 percent of Americans in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates. That's unchanged from last month and slightly off his high, 71 percent unfavorable in an ABC/Post poll nearly year ago. A majority strongly dislikes him, also unprecedented for a leading candidate. Ted Cruz is seen unfavorably by only . . . 53 percent. (Er, yay?) The same pollster finds Hillary isseen unfavorably by 52 percent. A widely-cited Morning Consult poll released earlier this week contends that Trump is a slightly better candidate than Ted Cruz. If you look closely at their Electoral College map, the big difference is that Trump carries . . . Maine and the states Romney won. Cruz carries . . . the states Romney won. Call me crazy, I'd like to see at least one or two direct polls of Maine voters offering them that head-to-head option before I put Maine in the red pile. The Morning Consult poll puts Utah, Arizona, and Mississippi firmly behind Trump, a result contradicted by at least one other poll in each state. (It also puts Trump's lead in Indiana at just two points.) Behold: Union Leaders Demanding Exemptions From Minimum-Wage Hikes! The heart of the liberal philosophy is, "I win, details to be worked out later." They want exactly what they want exactly when they want it, unless they decide they don't want it, and in that case, they want to be free to ignore what they just demanded. Behold: Union leaders against minimum-wage hikes! Los Angeles city council will hear a proposal on Tuesday to exempt union members from a $15 an hour minimum wage that the unions themselves have spent years fighting for. The proposal for the exemption was first introduced last year, after the Los Angeles city council passed a bill that would see the city's minimum wage increase to $15 by 2020. After drawing criticism last year, the proposed amendment was put on hold but is now up for consideration once again. Union leaders argue the amendment would give businesses and unions the freedom to negotiate better agreements, which might include lower wages but could make up the difference in other benefits such as healthcare. They argue that such exemptions might make businesses more open to unionization. The amendment was originally proposed by Rusty Hicks, executive secretary-treasurer of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO. AFL-CIO is the largest federation of labor unions in the US, with about 12.5 million members. Hicks is also the co-convener of the Campaign to Raise the Wage. Yes, one of the leading voices of "Campaign to Raise the Wage" is now leading the "Campaign to Exempt Me from the Raised Wage Because I'm Special." At the time of its passage, Hicks lauded the $15 minimum wage. "We are one step closer to making history in Los Angeles by adopting a comprehensive minimum wage policy that will change the lives of hundreds of thousands of hard-working Angelenos," said Hicks. "The city council's action today creates a path for workers to succeed and gives our economy the boost it needs to grow." Hicks did not respond to a request for comment. The proposal, however, has come under fire from both the workers and the businesses. "It's pretty hypocritical for unions to push a $15 wage law and then exempt themselves from the policy," Matt Haller, senior vice-president of communications and public affairs at the International Franchise Association, said. Considering the outcry, Hicks issued another statement last year saying that issues were "in need of further review". He also pointed out that other cities in California, including San Jose, Oakland, Richmond, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Long Beach have included similar clauses exempting unions in their wage bills. There is no consistency. There is no philosophy, no grander vision applicable equally to all. They simply want to get their way, in all circumstances, no matter how hypocritical or contradictory it is. As noted a few years ago, liberals don't really think their own rules apply to them. Exploitation? Michael Moore didn't use union workers on his film claiming that greedy corporations exploit workers. The Nation, which pays its interns the minimum wage of $7.25 per hour, wrote an open letter to Walmart demanding that it pay its workers at least $12 per hour. The American Prospect, which frequently demands a hike in the minimum wage, offers a $100 weekly stipend for a full-time internship. Some unions may pay you a bit more than that, namely $8.50 per hour, to protest and chant outside worksites where contractors are not using union labor. Don't give the unions too much grief about hiring non-union labor, though; Hillary Clinton served on the board of directors of Walmart from 1986 to 1992. We're Dealing with the Republican Version of the Obama Voter Colorado-based conservative blogger Jeff Goldstein offers a scorching, profane response to the Trump fans spinning conspiracy theories about how their man ended up with so few delegates in Goldstein's home state. Here are some of the cleaner parts: That's right. I'm part of the GOP Colorado "establishment" -- 40 percent of whom never participated in a caucus before and the overwhelming number of which went for Ted Cruz, who just a couple short years ago we all recognized as a principled opponent to the GOP ruling elite (before he became a Bushy globalist Canadian fake Christian, who loves amnesty and will likely, left unchecked, become the author of a New World Order run by transnational progressives from his perch atop the North American Union). This charge against me and against other movement conservatives in my state comes despite the fact that as a pre-condition to ratification of the Constitution, states insisted they be allowed to maintain their own election rules, and despite how our CO state caucus system, which we've had since 1912 or thereabouts, requires commitment, work, a series of elections, and in the end, actually picked a real Republican in the GOP primaries. Colorado for a few years held a non-binding straw poll. But we are not and haven't been a primary state. You are being lied to. And those doing the lying and hiding behind eagle pictures or pictures of Trump in armor ready to battle the Mexican hordes are, in a very real respect, advocating for a position that is (per the Framers) un-American . . . Here's the truth: Trump has received 45 percent of the delegates with 36 percent of the vote. He's won several caucus states and didn't complain then. I've heard not one of his supporters argue that winner-take-all races in Florida, or full delegate takes in South Carolina -- in neither of which state did he get a majority -- disenfranchised those who voted for someone other than Trump and who will have no representation on the first ballot at a contested GOP convention. The truth is, the "system" has helped him, as it does most front runners who aren't total incompetents and phony Republicans. You Trump backers are dishonest shills praying at the altar of a false god. You are fine with populist authoritarianism so long as you believe it is you who will benefit from the king's beneficence. You are, in short, Obama voters with Rs attached to your names. You are the problem. Because, just as we saw above with the union leaders opposing minimum-wage requirements for themselves, the core of the Trumpist philosophy is "I win, details to be worked out later." They want exactly what they want exactly when they want it, unless they decide they don't want it, and in that case, they want to be free to ignore what they just demanded. ADDENDA: We laughed at him, and we laughed at him . . . and yet, so far, Jim Gilmore won more votes than George Pataki in the primary: 2,903 votes to 2,013.  | 
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