But even if Ace is right and I can deliver much-needed conservative votes, it doesn’t change the fact that, as an analytical matter, Trump’s deficiencies aren’t with NeverTrumpers, they’re with millions of voters, the vast majority of whom have no idea who I am. Even if I could bring over the entire Jonah Goldberg Class, Trump would still be underwater with independent and moderate Republican women, minorities, etc. — because Donald Trump is a very bad candidate, which is why I think the people most responsible for a Republican loss in November are those who couldn’t or wouldn’t see that.

Ace sees NeverTrumpers as making some kind of cowardly commercial calculation in their arguments. He’s hardly alone in that belief. No doubt there’s some of that somewhere. But all I can tell you is that’s not how it seems from where I am sitting. No business manager or brand consultant would advise me to take the course I’ve taken. (I can just hear the late great Gene Wilder playing the Leo Bloom to my Max Bialystock: “You’ve got to alienate huge swaths of your book-buying fans and get yourself nearly banished from TV! We’ll make millions!”).

Still, I get why Ace has such contempt for NeverTrumpers. Since I am in a sharing mood, I will tell you who I have contempt for and it’s not Ace or the gang at American Greatness or even Sean Hannity. It’s the class of pro-Trump pundits and politicians who, the moment the cameras blink off, turn to me or my friends and say how awful Trump is. A related group are the political reporters who go on TV and skew their analysis so as to ensure that they don’t burn their sources in the Trump campaign, at least not until they write their post-election post-mortems. Another group are the commentators and opportunists who see Trump’s candidacy as a useful way to establish themselves as cable-news “celebrities” or boost their ratings. (I spelled this out in more detail in a G-File a few months back.) Perhaps the day will come when those names will be named.