Karl Rove said Sarah Palin has “thin skin” and that if she doesn’t “want to be speculated about as a potential presidential candidate, there’s an easy way to end the speculation: Simply say, ‘I’m not running.'”

“It is a sign of enormous thin skin that if we speculate about her she gets upset,” Mr. Rove said on Fox News. “I suspect if we didn’t speculate about her she’d be upset and try to get us to speculate about her.”

Mr. Rove, the former political strategist for President George W. Bush, and Ms. Palin, the former Alaska governor and 2008 GOP vice presidential candidate, have never been buddy-buddy, but it’s the latest volley in what is now an open confrontation between the two Republicans. Both are paid contributors for Fox News, which, like The Wall Street Journal, is owned by News Corp.

First, the background: On Saturday, Mr. Rove predicted Ms. Palin would join the presidential fray and suggested she would do so Labor Day weekend. The former governor is set to headline a tea party rally Sept. 3 in Iowa. That didn’t sit well with team Palin, and on Tuesday, Ms. Palin’s political action committee took a swipe at Mr. Rove: “Any professional pundit claiming to have ‘inside information’ regarding Governor Palin’s personal decision is not only wrong but their comments are specifically intended to mislead the American public.”…