This doesn’t make sense for a number of reasons...not the least of which is that Trump isn’t exactly known as being an icon of the Republican Party even though he may again be a registered Republican...and second of all, with Rove commenting on it he isn’t distancing himself from it and is instead turning Republicans in on themselves...he should have just said “I don’t agree with what Trump is saying but he is who he is” and let it go at that. Trump has no history of being a Republican Party loyalist or even a politician at all, so again this makes absolutely no sense for Rove to say even if he personally believes what Trump does and says is lunacy.
I think Trump and Rove are in this together as a carefully-scripted strategy to split the Palin primary vote and get the nomination to Romney.