HANS A. VON SPAKOVSKY: It’s Now 1984 at the University of Michigan.

It’s weird how the dark night of fascism is always descending in Red America, yet lands only in America’s Blue enclaves.

SCIENCE! CUNY Lists ‘Zim,’ ‘Ver,’ ‘Eeirself’ as ‘Gender Pronouns.’

$27,423 a year (for in-state residents) seems like an awful lot of money to learn made-up nonsense words.

ANOTHER TORPEDO CIRCLES BACK: Dems Give Up on Trying to Get Cable News to Care About Anything but Russia.

KARENNA GORE: Religious Leaders Should Urge Climate Activism on ‘Moral and Spiritual Level.’

She’s making a religious appeal because they’ve lost the factual debate, but also because “deep ecology” (and the “climate activism” it inspires) is an anti-human religion.

THE NEED FOR SPEED: Opel Astra Driver ‘Caught’ By Speed Camera Traveling Over 400 MPH.

CIVIL RIGHTS UPDATE: Republican Oklahoma Governor Vetoes ‘Constitutional Carry’ Bill, NRA Is Not Happy.

It’s almost a shame that Governor Fallin is term-limited and can’t be voted out of office this November.

WARMONGERING: YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG. Trump Administration Readying Israeli-Palestinian Peace Plan.

As the United States takes a historic step towards recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capitol, a point vehemently protested by Palestinian leaders, the senior administration official told the Free Beacon that this new reality is not being viewed as an impediment to peace.

The United States is in the “late phase,” in fact, of finalizing its peace plan that will be presented to both sides in the coming months.

The plan has been in the works for at least the past year, according to Trump administration officials, and will be presented “when the time is right.”

“We’ve been working hard and want to give the plan the best chance for success,” a senior administration official told the Free Beacon. “We want to get a lasting deal that is livable for both parties.”

Details of the plan are being kept tightly under wraps, but it is expected a public roll out of the peace plan will arrive within the next month to two months, sources said.

With Jerusalem off the table and the rest of the Arab world tired of Palestinian antics — which, to be fair, they subsidized for decades — the prospects for peace have never been better.

RICHARD FERNANDEZ: Has Iran Fallen Into a Strategic Trap?

The IDF, while formidable, is short-ranged. Its conflicts have all been fought on the border or within Israel itself. The United States, though able to project power long distances, did not have the political will or the obvious justification to mount a military action against Tehran. Thus, while the Islamic Republic of Iran stayed within its borders it was probably safe from any meaningful American or Israeli threat.

Viewed in this way, Israel’s problem has been how to bring its arch-foe within effective range. That problem may have been solved by the ayatollahs themselves. The Islamic Republic is now embroiled in three major campaigns: a proxy conflict with Saudi Arabia in Yemen; participation on behalf of the Assad regime in the Syrian civil war; a state of conflict with Israel across the Lebanese border via Hezbollah. These not only represent a considerable burden for Iran’s limited resources, they also bring a large part of Tehran’s forces within effective range of the IDF.

Read the whole thing.

FRACK, BABY, FRACK: Shale Drillers Look Beyond Texas as Prices Rise. “As Permian Basin experiences bottlenecks, companies look to fields in Colorado, North Dakota, Oklahoma and Wyoming.”

While the Permian Basin in Texas and New Mexico remains the fastest-growing shale spot, congested pipelines and shortages of labor and materials there are crimping profits, making other fields attractive alternatives.

EOG Resources Inc., EOG -1.29% one of the shale sector’s leaders, is active in the Permian but also in Colorado, North Dakota and Oklahoma. In Wyoming, the company has built up larger lease holdings and expanded production over the past two years.

Chief Executive Bill Thomas recently touted the “diversified assets” of EOG’s portfolio when discussing the company’s blockbuster first quarter, in which production rose 15% and profits surged more than 2,000% from a year earlier.

“Last year it was all about, ‘How much can you put in the Permian?’” said Daniel Romero, an analyst with the energy consulting firm Wood Mackenzie. “But now, a few months later, it’s what else are you doing outside of the Permian?”

Let’s see if we can’t drill our way to lower energy prices — again.

CONTAINMENT: Finland, Sweden and US sign trilateral agreement, with eye on increased exercises.

But speaking to Defense News after the signing, both visiting ministers emphasized that this is a starting point for future strengthened relations, and that there will be a particular emphasis on increasing and planning joint exercises.

“We need to work in a deeper way with exercises [in order] to develop interoperability. I think this agreement will make it easier for us to sit down together and plan for that sort of activity,” Hultqvist said. “So I think this is a platform to develop different sort of activities that can make more security and stability in our part of Europe.”

Niinistö called the potential for greater coordination and increased exercises the “most concrete and important part” of the letter, adding that the discussions will have an impact as Finland prepares to host a major exercise with its partners in 2021.

Even baby steps are a big deal, when they involve these two previously neutral nations.

PRIVACY: Facebook suspends 200 apps over data misuse investigation.

LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Embassy Opens Today in the Capital of Israel and Much, Much More. “Our European allies, desperate for economic relations with Hezbollah Iran to prop up their garbage economies are at risk of getting some big fat sanctions from the United States if they want to stay in the trashed Iran deal.”

VEDDY INTERESTING: Iran Threatened To Name Politicians Who Took BRIBES To Pass Nuclear Deal.

CHANGE: New Saudi TV station feeds into modernisation drive.

“This is a general channel that’s seeking to attract the new generation of Saudis,” said the station’s director Dawood Shirian, a frank-talking TV personality who previously hosted a talk show tapping into the public’s gripes.

“Most of the content, about 75 percent, is geared toward the youth between 15 and 35 years old,” Shirian told AFP, adding that SBC would “complement the changes seen in the kingdom in the artistic, cultural and entertainment spheres”.

Shirian was poached late last year from private rival MBC to head up the state-run Saudi Broadcasting Corporation, and to mastermind the launch of SBC.

The move was seen as a deliberate shock for the state broadcaster — one in a series of radical changes guided by Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.

The 32-year-old heir to the Saudi throne, who declared to foreign investors in Riyadh last October that his generation of Saudis “want to live a normal life”, is seen as the guiding hand behind the lifting of longstanding social restrictions.

The real test will come when producers at SBC take a pitch for a Saudi reboot of Xena: Warrior Princess.

CHANGE MORE OF THE SAME: Maduro’s biggest test comes after election day in Venezuela. “Widely expected to be re-elected on May 20, the president faces a mounting crisis.”

Dimitris Pantoulas, a political analyst based in Caracas, believes the president’s confidence is well-founded. “Maduro will win. Of that I have zero doubt,” he said. “What’s more, I don’t think he’ll even need to resort to outright fraud on election day to do it. The electoral process is skewed so much in his favour that he will get the votes he needs.”

The bigger question is what Mr Maduro will do after next Sunday’s vote given the magnitude of Venezuela’s economic collapse, mounting international opposition to his rule, social discontent at home and increasing restiveness within the armed forces.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a coup within Chavismo . . . He [Maduro] can’t keep running the country like this,” Mr Pantoulas said. referring to the ruling movement formed by the late President Hugo Chávez, Mr Maduro’s patron and predecessor. “Venezuela at the moment is ungovernable.”

Oh please. Venezuela isn’t ungovernable — it’s suffering from a surfeit of government. And now that the country is about out of things for the socialists to loot, that’s the last surplus Venezuelans will “enjoy” until the socialists are gone.

YUGE, IF TRUE:

In the next tweet they explain, “Iran’s Shahid Bagheri Missile Industries Company & other companies connected to Iranian Defense Industries Organization were dependent on NorthKorea to design & develop their short & intermediate range ballistic missiles for IRGC. Now North Korea has left them.”

Hat tip to Flight 93 Militia, but that’s all I’ve been able to find on this story so far. If this is real, none of the major news outlets have caught wind of it yet — or they aren’t bothering to report it.

BLUE WAVE? Sorry, there’s not going to be any ‘blue tidal wave’ this fall.

Jared Whitley:

The writing is simply not on the wall for a Democratic blow-out. The president’s approval rating has been consistently higher than Obama enjoyed at the same point in his presidency. Economic news has been staggeringly good. The unemployment rate is at a 44-year low. The Democrats have no coherent message. The NRA is flush with cash following this year’s extremist anti-gun rhetoric. And the RNC has 40 million dollars more than the “dead broke” DNC.

Now, this is not to suggest that Republicans will make huge gains themselves. Honestly, how many more offices are left for Republicans to win? The only place where Republicans could see real growth is California, where we might not even be able to field a candidate for governor or senator. The party’s silver lining for the Golden State is, as always, that California is the living embodiment of the failure of left-wing politics. With no grown-ups in Sacramento, California’s pain is the Republicans’ gain.

And for their electoral woes in the other 49 states, Democrats have no one to blame but themselves.

The underlying numbers — political and economic — run the gamut from great to not too bad, which is about as much as anyone could ask for. But I’d feel better if the GOP Congress were legislating as though they gave a damn.

DANIEL FLYNN: Donald Trump’s Best Week Ever.

The missteps and crashes of celebrity Trump haters over the past seven days compounds matters for the rank-and-file Trump haters.

Eric Schneiderman, who sued the Trump administration over immigration, the environment, transsexual rights, and much else, resigned this week over allegations that he physically abused several women, including one who got slapped for boldly refusing his advances. Late last year, TBS host Samantha Bee called Schneiderman “Spiderman” and compared him to Superman. Bee be like, “You’re gonna save us” and “you are a superhero.” One woman’s Superman is another bruised woman’s Lex Luthor.

Michael Avenatti, the camera-friendly lawyer of Stormy Daniels, issued startling allegations that President Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen received payments from such places as Kenya, Russia, and Malaysia. “No, I never talk with or meet Trump,” a 26-year-old El Al employee named Michael Cohen told NBC News. He received a wire transaction from his brother in Kenya. “He owed me some money.” The real Michael Cohen’s lawyer wrote of a Canadian with the same name who received money from Tanzania, “The Michael Cohen who was actually involved in this transaction has expressed grave concerns about the breach of his privacy by Mr. Avenatti’s apparently improper possession and publication of his personal bank records.”

Marc Cohen of “Walking in Memphis” fame, Mets play-by-play man Gary Cohen, and comic actor Sacha Baron Cohen remain safe from Avenatti’s probe — but for how long?

Plus:

What’s most amusing is, being in possession of the “vision of the anointed,” the Left can neither help itself from overreaching, nor learn from its mistakes when it does.

HIGH-TECH FEUDALISM: Victor Davis Hanson Says ‘California is a Medieval Society.’

HIT BACK TWICE AS HARD: Gun Manufacturers Fire Back at Dick’s Sporting Goods, Halt Sales.

WHAT A LONG, STRANGE TRIP: The Plane that Accidentally Circumnavigated the World. “After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, the crew of Pan Am flight 18602 were forced to do something almost impossible: return to America the long way round.”

Great read.

BLUE ON BLUE: NBC Head of Human Resources to Resign Amidst Matt Lauer Fallout.

But as the NYT’s Katie Rosman noted on Twitter, “The only person at NBC to take a fall for the mismanagement of Matt Lauer is … a woman.”

JOHN HAWKINS: 5 Ways Liberals Create Racism. “How the Left has dragged America backward on race over the last decade.”

Or as the original Ezra Klein said, “Divide and conquer – first. But then, unite and rule.”

FIRST THEY TAKE YOUR GUNS, THEN THEY TAKE YOUR SPEECH: UK Proposes Prison Time For Offensive Online Posts.

FORGET IT, HE’S TROLLING: Crowd at Indiana rally cheers when Trump suggests he deserves an ‘extension’ on his presidency beyond two terms.