FALLOUT: Russia Curbs Gas Supplies to Germany in Warning for Europe.

DEAL OF THE DAY? Is this “Let’s Go Brandon” baseball cap really a deal of the day? If so, that is surprise.

CHRIS QUEEN: Fighting the Narrative™ on Repealing Roe v. Wade. “Conservatives won the fight in Florida, but the ‘Don’t Say Gay’ smear turned war into a two-front battle of legislation and propaganda. The same principles are at play in the abortion debate that has blown up after the leak of a draft from the Supreme Court that suggests that the justices are ready to overturn Roe v. Wade.”

ALWAYS TAKE INITIAL REPORTS WITH A GRAIN OF SALT: A Journalist Just Spotted Russia’s ‘Admiral Makarov’ Frigate, Intact And At Sea. “But it’s worth noting where Sutton found Admiral Makarov on or before Monday: sailing near Sevastopol in the Russian-occupied Crimean Peninsula. In other words, close to home.”

SHOT:

Chaser:

Hangover: Even the New York Times gives Trump credit for getting vaccine production going’ – as he boasts ‘I hope everyone remembers when they get their beautiful shot.’

SPACE: Extraordinary Photo of the Supermassive Black Hole at the Center of Our Galaxy.

HMM: Elon Musk says Twitter deal ‘temporarily on hold.’

Elon Musk said Friday that his plan to buy Twitter for $44 billion is “temporarily on hold” as he tries to pinpoint the exact number of spam and fake accounts on the social media platform, another twist amid signs of internal turmoil over the proposed acquisition.

Musk, who has been vocal about his desire to clean up Twitter’s problem with “spam bots” that mimic real people, appeared to question whether the company was underreporting them.

In a tweet, the Tesla billionaire linked to a Reuters story from May 2 about a quarterly report from Twitter that estimated false or spam accounts made up fewer than 5% of the company’s “monetizable daily active users” in the first quarter.

“Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users,” Musk said, indicating he’s skeptical that the number of inauthentic accounts is that low.

Also: Top Twitter execs, including heads of revenue and consumer products, are out following Musk deal.

Coincidence?

BUT IT’S FOR THE CHILDREN: They make your kids wear masks and stare at a computer screen instead of a real, live human being. They steal your kids’ innocence by exposing them sexual extremism. They deprive them of actual education they must have to succeed in life. And they make baby formula all but impossible to find.

But, as Issues & Insights points out this morning:

“From lockdowns to abortion advocacy to woke public schools, leftist policies have had a disastrous impact on America’s children. Sadly, in this ‘War on Children,’ kids are the far-left’s targets.”

But never forget, it’s all for the kids.

KRUISER’S MORNING BRIEFING: The Biden Justice Department Is Unfocused and Unhinged. “The United States has plenty of real problems but this administration keeps going after phantoms under the bed. Now President LOLEightyonemillion is running around babbling about the dangerous ‘Ultra MAGA’ bogeymen that are rattling around in that empty brain of his.”

UPDATED VERSION NOW AVAILABLE:  If you haven’t had a chance to read A Dubious Expediency–my 2015 essay on the problem with mismatch on campuses–the updated version (2021) is now available electronically.

(Or you can buy it here in a book that also contains essays by Heather Mac Donald, Peter Kirsanow, Peter Wood, Maimon Schwarzschild and others.  The book is named for the essay.)

IT’S GOOD TO BE THE NOMENKLATURA:

I enjoy being old enough now that baby formula is no longer a concern. No more diaper changes, either, which is lovely.

But it seems sociopathic to blithely dismiss the very real concerns of parents having trouble feeding their babies.

So keep it up, lefties. The great middle of America needs to see what you really are.

BIDENFLATION: Wholesale inflation climbs 11% in April, remaining near 40-year high. “Economists expected the producer price index to show prices climbed by 10.7% in April.”

A POSTCARD FROM THE PROPRIETOR:

BIDEN’S RETURN TO DECENCY: Do House Dems Want Supreme Court Justices Menaced? Looks That Way.

R.I.P.  JOHN LEO:   He was a lovely man and always willing to do battle with political correctness.  He will be missed.

HOW THE JACOBINS GOT CONTROL OF NORTH CAROLINA’S BIG 4 UNIVERSITIES. With an E.B. White quote I had never heard, but which is increasingly topical:

One need only watch totalitarians at work to see that once men gain power over other men’s minds, that power is never used sparingly or wisely, but lavishly and brutally and with unspeakable results.

OPEN THREAD: Here you go, way too fast.

CHRISTIAN TOTO: Top Gun: Maverick – No Woke, Just Thrills and Nostalgia on Steroids.

OPINION: R.I.P. Randy Weaver: Ruby Ridge is not forgotten.

JOHN NOLTE: Washington Post Op-Ed Demands Name Change at George Washington University.

The Washington Post — a newspaper named Washington — published an editorial calling for a name change at George Washington University.

You can’t make this shit up.

The op-ed, written by a senior currently attending George Washington University, is 800 or so words of the usual-usual, shockingly ignorant moral preening we’ve come to expect from the Woke McCarthyites. So let me sum it up: This university is racist, and George Washington was racist, and while I didn’t find this offensive enough to pass up attending school here, harrumph, harrumph, harrumph, half-truth, half-truth, half-truth, I’m so virtuous, I’m so virtuous, I’m so virtuous…

This crybaby loon also wants Winston Churchill blacklisted from the campus:

The controversial Winston Churchill Library must go. The university’s contentious colonial moniker must go. Even the university’s name, mascot and motto — “Hail Thee George Washington”— must be replaced. The hypocrisy of GW in not addressing these issues is an example of how Black voices and Black grievances go ignored and highlights the importance of strong Black leadership.

To be fair, it’s understandable that a paper that is eager to advance socialism nationally would publish a column whose author is angry with the man who beat National Socialism. But if Post management itself is actually tired of the first half of their paper’s name, shouldn’t they go first in changing it? Bezos coordinate! Bezos coordinate!

UPDATE: Rod Dreher on The Generation That Hates George Washington: “This privileged twerp — where do you even start? Remember how we were all told that it was just the Confederate statues they were after, not the Founding Fathers, for heaven’s sake? It will never happen, and when it does, you bigots will deserve it. Wakanda forever! My challenge to you is to find a single prominent liberal commentator who forthrightly denounces this repugnant crap. They can’t do it, even if they think it, because they are terrified of the radicals in their midst.”

(Updated and bumped.)

REPORT: Gulf War Syndrome mystery solved: US scientists blame the condition on SARIN gas released into the air when Iraq’s chemical weapons cache was bombed.

MARGARET SANGER SMILES: Dem Rep. Katie Porter: Inflation makes legal abortion that much more necessary.

I’ll leave you with this clip, which went viral yesterday. An absolute prerequisite for Porter’s message not backfiring on the party is Americans believing that inflation just sort of … happened, like an earthquake, not that it was the foreseeable result of the governing party’s insistence on fantastically extravagant spending in the midst of a supply-chain crisis. I don’t believe that prerequisite will be met: Last week’s CNN poll found 55 percent saying that Biden’s policies have made the economy worse, up from 45 percent in December. This Univision anchor is obviously among those 55 percent. Man, is he ever.

Here's @lcvelez, closing out tonight's #LineaDeFuego (Firing Line), on Univision 24/7. 👀 pic.twitter.com/RMm0NZ6vmm

— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) May 11, 2022

MEGAN FOX: The First Rule of Gay Club Is You DO NOT Talk About Gay Club! Groomer Teachers Plot on Zoom.

K-12 IMPLOSION UPDATE: The CRT-Industrial Complex.

CHRISTIAN TOTO: ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ – No Woke, Just Thrills and Nostalgia on Steroids.