Happy Primary Day! 'There's Nobody That's Done So Much for Equality as I Have.' A quote from Salena Zito's column in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review: "If Trump wins decisively, then conservatives are everything we've ever been accused of being: racist, nativist, xenophobic and totally comfortable with big government as long as it benefits people we happen to like," said Tom Nichols, a senior contributor at online magazine The Federalist and professor at the Naval War College. Donald Trump's counterpoint, this morning: "There's nobody that's done so much for equality as I have. You take a look at Palm Beach, Florida -- I built the Mar-a-Lago club -- totally open to everybody. A club that, frankly, set a new standard in clubs and a new standard in Palm Beach." Allahpundit: There are a lot of like-minded trolls on Twitter but only a fool would extrapolate broad conclusions about the total electorate from a social-media niche. I did notice today, though, that Ben Shapiro of Breitbart -- a vocal anti-Trumper -- has been regularly retweeting anti-semitic cartoons and messages that have been tweeted at him for criticizing Trump. I asked him if it's common for him to get attacked that way when he opposes a politician. He said no, that this is as bad as it's been since Hamas supporters started spamming him for defending Israel during the Gaza war, but he doesn't think the trolls represent most Trump fans. (Neither do I.) Tapper also retweeted someone who referred to him as "Jew Jake Tapper" with the comment "All day, this garbage." John Podhoretz, another Trump critic, replied to that by claiming he gets 75 tweets like that each night. Hot Air alum Noah Rothman, also anti-Trump, is getting it too. Other Jewish conservatives have made similar complaints. This will continue to be mostly ignored in the primary, partly because it's deeply embarrassing to the GOP to acknowledge it and partly because supposedly there's nothing worse than being politically correct, even when being "politically incorrect" is taken as a license to call people "kikes." You'll hear a lot about it this summer, though, once the Democrats and the wider media emerge as the country's main anti-Trump political force and they start bearing the brunt of this. Hope Trump's got better spin by then than "my earpiece didn't work." Don't Worry, World. John Kerry's Got This. The world keeps turning, even during primary season. Is there any better encapsulation of John Kerry's diplomacy than him asking Bashir Assad to "show some decency"? U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has accused President Bashar al-Assad's regime of obstructing deliveries of humanitarian aid in Syria, calling on it to show "some measure of decency" during the truce there. Speaking at a media conference in Washington with his German counterpart Monday, Kerry said a February 11 agreement to implement a cessation of hostilities in Syria had already resulted in direct aid reaching 116,000 people. But Kerry said he was concerned by reports that the regime "continues to drag its feet" in providing permits for the aid to get through. "And so we call on the Assad regime to, at least in a moment of cessation of hostilities, try to show some measure of decency, if that is even possible." "Play nice, Satan!" A quick reminder on who we're dealing with here: A dossier compiled by the French government used 55,000 photos smuggled out of the country by a former Syrian army officer, showing 11,000 alleged victims of forces loyal to President Assad, according to various media reports. The UN, world leaders and human rights groups have long condemned the Syrian regime for alleged atrocities including barrel bombings and chemical attacks on civilians, as well as kidnapping, torture and extrajudicial executions. An estimated 250,000 people have been killed in Syria's four-year civil war, where the government, rebels, Islamist groups and Isis are fighting for territory. A further 11 million people have been displaced from their homes, with hundreds of thousands of refugees risking their lives to seek safety in Europe so far this year. "Show some decency"? They have no decency. What more does Assad's regime have to do to make that clear to Kerry? No, really, what else could they do to underline it? Today I'll Be Voting for . . . It's primary day in Virginia, so I'll be voting today. I could live really happily under a Ted Cruz presidency. Given a magic wand, I'd like to see Supreme Court Justice Ted Cruz, with that giant detail-oriented, legal-encyclopedia noggin of his helping protect our Constitutional rights for the next 40 years instead of the next four to eight. A role like that just seems like the best match for his skillset -- analysis, thinking, dedication to the Founders' principles. Fairly or not, Cruz doesn't seem like the ideal figure to get a conservative agenda through Congress. (It's a little unnerving the way Cruz's Senate colleagues seem to detest him. Et tu, Senator Sessions?) John Kasich's a no-go. I've never cared for candidates who run as "the Republican for people who don't like Republicans!" triangulation-style. Sorry, "Prince of Light and Hope," I reject your theological conclusion that Jesus would tell us the only way we can care for the poor is by expanding Medicaid. Beyond all that, he's got about four stories that he keeps repeating. Did you know he was the son of a mailman? Ben Carson? Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha. In fact, now that Dr. Carson has declared, "I've vowed to continue our campaign as long as we have revenue and support" -- after raising $57 million to win four delegates so far -- can everybody who thought Ben Carson was such a swell guy, with such sterling character and impeccable judgment, say "mea culpa"? Carson plods onward, declaring that his best friend and business manager Armstrong Williams is "not necessarily the epitome of truth." He raised a ton of money, only to spend it all on more fundraising instead of expenditures that actually won votes. Carson assesses his campaign staff, "We had people who didn't really seem to understand finances. or maybe they did -- maybe they were doing it on purpose." (Carson paid his finance chair $20,000 per month. Traditionally, that's an unpaid honorary role.) Gee, who could have seen Ben Carson's having odd business partners, questions about money, and slippery answers coming? I'll be pleasantly surprised if Carson doesn't endorse Trump -- you know, the guy who compared him to a child molester. That leaves Marco Rubio. On most issues, he's plenty conservative. Yes, the Gang of Eight was a legislative monstrosity, a panicked response to the 2012 election, and Rubio's lucky it died in the House. Any amnesty push by a President Rubio would run into that same skeptical House and would probably doom his reelection prospects. Most of my other favorite conservative leaders in the GOP -- Bobby Jindal, Pat Toomey, Cory Gardner -- have endorsed Rubio. And for what it's worth, Rubio is just nuking Hillary Clinton in the head-to-head matchups. Dear God, what a thrill for the Republican party to be the party of the young, of the future, the candidate of change while the Democrats run grandma, facing an indictment or an FBI Director's resignation in protest, whose entire modus operandi has been about helping herself and her cronies. Back in 2008, Barack Obama made people feel good about themselves for voting for him -- by voting for him, they were demonstrating that an African American could reach the highest office in the land. (He obviously didn't bring about the glorious age of racial harmony that Obama voters foresaw.) At his best, Rubio could do something similar: remind us that this country is great, that the most unlikely among us can achieve amazing things with determination and hard work and that the American dream will thrive if we can just clear out the progressive weeds that are choking the garden. No candidate articulates the American dream better: I regret my father did not live to see this day in person. He used to tell me all the time: En este pais, ustedes van a poder lograr todas las cosas que nosotros no pudimos -- "In this country, you will achieve all the things we never could." On days when I am tired or discouraged, I remember the sound of his keys jingling at the front door of our home, often well past midnight, as he returned from another long day at work. When I was younger, I didn't fully appreciate all he did for us, but now as my own children grow older, I fully understand. My father was grateful for the work he had, but that was not the life he wanted for his children. He wanted all the dreams he once had for himself to come true for us. He wanted all the doors that closed for him to be open for me. If you prefer somebody else, that's fine. If you want to dismiss everything I've written as that of a pro-Rubio hack, I can't stop you. (Although for accuracy purposes, I was really a pro-Jindal hack, could have very happily been a pro-Perry hack, was intrigued with being a Carly Fiorina hack, and would have been content to be a pro-Walker hack.) I'm not a Rubio true believer and wish everyone would stop falling in love with candidates. These guys are contractors. We hire them for a four-year gig and if they're good, we renew 'em for another four years. ADDENDA: Blogger Robert Stacy McCain is no stranger to controversy. If somebody at Twitter High Command, and the Orwellian-sounding "Trust and Safety Council" pointed to a particular Tweet or message from McCain that threatened someone or constituted abuse, we could have the debate of whether it warranted shutting down McCain's account. But Twitter refuses to specify what McCain did that warranted the Twitter account death sentence: A spokesperson explained in an email that Twitter doesn't comment on individual accounts "for privacy and security reasons." I requested the tweets that got McCain blocked. No dice. Techies love to talk about transparency, but not for themselves. I reached out to Sarkeesian: no response. I reached out to a woman who tweeted that McCain harassed her friend: no reply. McCain would talk. He noted that of the 40 organizations on the Twitter Council, many are left-leaning and none is conservative or libertarian. The Twitter Council is an echo chamber. "There are some people who just can't stand the idea that someone could have access to Twitter or anything, or a platform to be able to criticize them," McCain told me. They don't believe in freedom of expression for others. Free speech is not safe. And Jack Dorsey has made them Twitter's bouncers. Look, maybe Robert Stacy McCain wrote something that warranted a response from Twitter, maybe he didn't. But as of now, he's getting punished without even knowing what his crime was.  | 
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