One-Third of Americans: Who's This Scalia Guy? Gallup reminds us of just how oblivious most Americans are when it comes to the Supreme Court: In July of last year, popular perceptions of the conservative jurist were evenly divided, with 29% seeing him favorably and 27% unfavorably. Scalia, whom one prominent legal scholar named "the most influential justice of the last quarter-century," was nonetheless unknown to nearly a third of Americans (32%) and generated no opinion from another 12% in 2015, Scalia's 29th year on the nation's top court. Strangely, the percentage of people who said they had "never heard of" Antonin Scalia increased from 29 percent in 2001 to 39 percent in 2005. Was that the Greatest Generation, who read newspapers, dying off and the Millennials, who never look up from their cell phones, entering the polling sample? This is a free country, and you're free to not care, and free to not pay any attention to, say, one-third and arguably our most powerful branch of government. I understand the sense that it would be a better world if we could spend more time thinking less about what government is doing about more pleasant things -- food, sports, movies, home furnishings, how awesome the finale of Gravity Falls was, etc. But if you choose to pay no attention to these things, and refuse to read anything about them, watch anything about them, or learn anything about them . . . then I'd rather you left the voting to those of us who do care. (This is also a key data point for those who think the next Supreme Court justice will be a pivotal issue in the 2016 elections. This matters to the bases of each party, but not the less-engaged, less-interested voters.) Harsh as it sounds, some voters may be calling for policies and philosophies that they don't understand: A 2010 CBS/New York Times survey found that when Americans were asked to use their own words to define the word "socialism" millennials were the least able to do so. Accord to the survey, only 16 percent of millennials could define socialism as government ownership, or some variation thereof, compared to 30 percent of Americans over 30 (and 57% of tea partiers, incidentally). Can we get some pollster to ask that question again, and see if the numbers have changed in the past six years? As Long as It's Trump against a Crowd, Trump Wins Yes, it's Public Policy Polling, a Democratic firm, but these polling results are more or less in line with the last few polls in South Carolina: Behind Trump, who has 35 percent support in a new poll, U.S. Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas are tied for second place -- at 18 percent each, according to a Public Policy Polling survey released exclusively Monday to The State. Ohio Gov. John Kasich is in fourth at 10 percent support, followed by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, tied with 7 percent support each. Public Policy interviewed 897 likely GOP primary voters Sunday and Monday – the first look at how after Saturday night's Republican presidential debate affected the race. The poll has a margin of error of 3.3 percentage points. If these sorts of results come to pass, the conventional wisdom will conclude Trump is the most likely Republican nominee, and with good reason. His debate performance wasn't bad enough to dissuade his base, and until the opposition to Trump congeals around one alternative, he'll probably have the biggest slice of the pie. Polling in the March 1 and March 8 primary states is sparse, but just about every survey conducted in those states shows Trump leading, except for Texas, a state with complicated winner-take-most rules. Cruz leads there. We don't have any recent polls in Nevada, but Trump was ahead in the most recent one, conducted in December. John Kasich is spending two days in Michigan this week. One poll conducted at the beginning of the month forgot to list him as a candidate; the other had him at 6 percent. Oh, Hey, Russia's Bombing Cities Now, No Big Deal At some point in the future, the "international community" will protest and denounce some U.S. military action. The same "international community" that is shrugging and yawning as Russia uses cluster bombs in the city of Aleppo, Syria: A shocking video shows an entire district destroyed by Russian cluster bombs in Aleppo as air strikes hit five hospitals and two schools. The death toll after the attacks in Syria today has risen to 50 with many more expected to be wounded. It is believed that among those dead are children and the bombings have been condemned by U.N. chiefs. U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haqsaid said the attacks were 'blatant violations of international laws' that 'are further degrading an already devastated health care system and preventing access to education in Syria.' Where are all the people protesting in the streets of Europe and the United States? Where are the giant paper-mâché heads? All of this bombing of hospitals and schools is starting to make our government doubt Russia's good intentions. The U.S. said the airstrikes Monday in and around Aleppo, Syria's biggest city, targeted innocent civilians, including at two hospitals. At least 50 people were killed at medical facilities and schools in rebel-held areas in Aleppo and Idlib provinces, the United Nations said. State Department spokesman John Kirby said the bombing of civilian targets "casts doubt on Russia's willingness and/or ability to help bring to a stop the continued brutality of the Assad regime against its own people." Gee, what was your first clue, Sherlock? For what it's worth, Russia says, "Nothing to see here, move along, move along." Russia on Tuesday rebuffed claims that its warplanes struck a hospital in northern Syria in airstrikes the previous day that killed at least nine people as Syrian government forces and a predominantly Kurdish coalition are making against rival groups in the country's north. In Moscow, President Vladimir Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that the hospital report was another case in which those who make such accusations against Russia are unable to back up their claims. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights had said Russian warplanes targeted the hospital in Idlib province on Monday, destroying it and killing nine people. France said that such attacks "could constitute war crimes." Peskov, in a conference call with journalists, referred the parties making the accusations to the "primary source" and said they should rely on official announcements from the Syrian government. ADDENDA: Jonah mentions yesterday's Jolt in his syndicated column today: As my National Review colleague Jim Geraghty has pointed out, Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) gave a blistering speech in 2007 vowing to do everything he could to prevent President George W. Bush from appointing any more conservatives to the bench. Schumer said John G. Roberts Jr. and Samuel A. Alito Jr. were quite enough for one president. Switch the names in that speech from Roberts, Alito and Bush to Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor and Obama and you have McConnell's position now. Any claim that Republicans are the first to break the peace is as absurd as the suggestion that Obama is blameless for the polarization and meanness in our politics. Most of our political debates amount to, "Yes, but my side isn't extreme and yours is."  | 
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