Good morning, it’s Thursday already. This week is flying by – for a full work week, that is.
And, big news this morning: There is no rain in the forecast.
Yes, you read that right! There is NO RAIN in the forecast…today, anyway. I can’t say anything for the weekend – or the days immediately following it. But for today, we have cloudy skies in the morning, followed by a partial clearing in the afternoon and temperatures in the mid-80s.
A nice, solid July day. Get out and enjoy it while you can.
It’s National Tapioca Pudding Day…yep, a whole day to celebrate the sweet dessert concoction made from balls of starch derived from the cassava root.
Cassava, by the way, is similar in shape and color to a sweet potato, but don’t be fooled, as this is no ordinary tuber. In its natural form, cassava contains cyanide.
When ground down into a flour or powder, cassava can be safely used as a thickening agent and also can be used to create those little tapioca pearls. These have a very long shelf life, which made them popular for long journeys and in early American cooking as there wasn’t much in the way of refrigeration at the time.
If you’re planning to make tapioca, you have to plan ahead, because the pearls need to be soaked overnight in order to rehydrate them before mixing them with water, eggs, milk, sugar and vanilla to make the pudding that so divides pudding lovers.
You either love it, or you hate it. I happen to be in the love it camp, though rice pudding is better and bread pudding better still.
In fact, in my book, bread pudding trumps chocolate pudding any day. Come at me.
It’s a big day if you’re a horse racing fan, as the 153rd meet at Saratoga gets underway.
In the headlines…
President Joe Biden made the case for his sweeping, two-track infrastructure initiative on Capitol Hill, a day after leading Senate Democrats agreed on a $3.5 trillion plan billed as the biggest boost in decades for U.S. families.
Several centrist Democrats took a neutral stance on the agreement, saying they needed to review details of funding expanded access to preschool and affordable child care, broader Medicare benefits and programs to combat poverty and climate change.
Democrats have agreed to include a tax on imports from nations that lack aggressive climate change policies as part of the sweeping $3.5 trillion budget plan stocked with other provisions aimed at ratcheting down fossil fuel pollution in the U.S.
In what may be a seminal moment in the global effort to fight climate change, Europe challenged the rest of the world by laying out an ambitious blueprint to pivot away from fossil fuels over the next nine years – potentially setting off global trade disputes.
Millions of families with children will see more money in their bank accounts today as part of the newly expanded Child Tax Credit.
Sen. Marco Rubio is increasing his calls for Biden to aid the people of Cuba who need food and medical supplies as support in Central Florida continues to grow for people demanding change in the communist country.
The Biden administration is examining the possibility of setting up an emergency hotline with the Chinese government similar to the so-called “red phone” established between the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War as a means to avoid nuclear war.
Biden’s nominations of two Arizona anti-Trump Republicans to ambassadorships will likely be a key part of the president’s strategy to win the state again in 2024, local strategists believe.
Biden pledged during his presidential campaign to overhaul the country’s ethics and campaign-finance laws, promising to usher in a new era of government transparency, but six months later still hasn’t delivered on many of those promises.
The president will host German Chancellor Angela Merkel today in what is likely to be her last visit to Washington as head of state.
Former President George W. Bush trashed Biden’s decision to withdraw from Afghanistan, saying it would likely lead to a takeover by the fundamentalist Taliban.
Thousands of recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program are reportedly trying to keep or renew their permits to remain in the U.S., but the process has stalled because of a backlog of applications that piled up amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
As Americans look to resume international travel, the State Department is struggling to clear a backlog of passport applications that is frustrating some travelers, and an official said an increase in staffing won’t immediately resolve the delays.
Delta Air Lines said U.S. vacation travel has fully recovered as the airline reported its first quarterly profit since the Covid-19 pandemic crushed the industry last year.
As Covid raged, so did the country’s other epidemic. Drug overdose deaths rose nearly 30 percent in 2020 to a record 93,000, according to preliminary statistics released Wednesday by the CDC. It’s the largest single-year increase recorded.
The battle against COVID-19 is intensifying once again as the Delta variant causes surges across the country among the unvaccinated, and more breakthrough cases are reported among those who have received their shots.
Data from overseas, particularly Britain, suggest the spread of the virus will set vaccinated and unvaccinated communities on very different paths.
Face masks will continue to be mandatory on London’s subways and buses even after the government lifts the legal requirement to wear them on July 19, the city’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, said.
Children will likely pay the price for adults in the U.S. not getting vaccinated at high enough rates to slow or stop the spread of Covid-19, which has been surging in most states, a vaccine expert said.
As the Delta variant rips through conservative swaths of the country, some elected Republicans are facing growing pressure from public health advocates to speak out in favor of vaccines and against conservative outlets that question their efficacy.
A homoeopathic doctor in California became the first person in the United States to face federal charges over fake COVID-19 immunizations and falsified coronavirus vaccine cards.
For more than a year since the coronavirus outbreak, New York State officials have stuck with an approach that has allowed the state to report a lower and incomplete death toll.
A New York City traveler flipped out when she was kicked off a Royal Caribbean cruise for having COVID-19 — fuming that the company “falsified” her test results, according to wild footage.
Fueled by the Delta variant, daily coronavirus case counts in New York City have climbed in recent days, even as the city seems determined to turn the page on the pandemic.
Vaccines offered powerful protection against the coronavirus in New York City, blunting the second wave of the virus and saving an estimated 8,300 lives between December of last year and July of this year, according to a new study by Yale University.
Assemblywoman Diana Richardson snapped at a reporter after being asked whether it was hypocritical of her to appear at a press conference with Gov. Andrew Cuomo months after demanding he resign over sexual misconduct allegations.
“I’m here today with the governor because politics is politics, business is business,” Richardson said at the news conference with Cuomo in Brooklyn. “At the end of the day, we have a job to do.” She called the question “inappropriate.”
Cuomo lavished praise on Democratic mayoral nominee Eric Adams during a joint appearance in Brooklyn — and so did Eric Adams.
New York City, the governor said, needs to serve as a model for the rest of the country, and he believes Adams has both “courage and competence” to fulfill the job of mayor.
The two met at the Lenox Road Baptist Church in Brooklyn to discuss gun violence, vowing to work together should Adam win in November.
“I worked with Eric when he was in the Senate and he is going to be extraordinary,” Cuomo said. “Eric and I come from the same political philosophy. We are progressive Democrats and we have the same definition of what it means to be a progressive Democrat.”
The appearance marked the second time this week that Adams moved to cement his relationships with the forces that will have extraordinary sway over his ability to govern as he embraces the role of mayor-in-waiting ahead of a November general election.
Mayor Bill de Blasio steered clear of criticizing Adams for meeting with Cuomo, while reiterating that he still believes the governor should resign over allegations of sexual misconduct and coronavirus mismanagement.
Adams and his Republican rival Curtis Sliwa got into a heated spat over gun violence prevention, a pressing topic that will likely remain front-and-center for the rest of the race amid a troubling spike in shootings across the five boroughs.
Sliwa decried Adams’ victory lap prior to the November general election.
Roughly 4,400 youth jobs are expected to be rolled out in New York City as the first part of the state’s response to what Cuomo has deemed a gun violence state of emergency.
Adams decried the city’s increasing lawlessness and said officials needed to address recent soft-on-crime initiatives
Bullets flew again in Times Square early yesterday, and when an area business leader complained about the city’s failure to curb the frightening violence, a spokesman for de Blasio dismissed his remarks “not productive” and “insulting” to cops.
A moratorium on the death penalty will not stop federal prosecutors from pursuing capital punishment on a case-by-case basis, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Brooklyn said.
After coming up repeatedly during the Democratic mayoral primary, a bill to enfranchise noncitizens in New York City elections appears to be within close reach.
A group of investors is set to start a new team to replace the Staten Island Yankees that will play out of the Richmond County Bank Ballpark on the shores of New York Harbor.
After taking a break last year, goats have returned to Riverside Park help fend off invasive plant species. New Yorkers can use ranked-choice voting to pick their favorites.
New York was one of the last states in the country to launch a COVID rent relief program with money from the federal government this spring. And the funds have yet to start flowing.
A nurse who treated New York’s coronavirus “patient zero” has settled her suit alleging a hospital grossly mishandled the virus, resulting in she and her whole family getting extremely sick from it, new court papers show.
De Blasio’s planning department is moving forward with a “dangerous” proposal pushed by a union backer that would stifle hotel development — a goal he has continued to seek while also attempting to revive the City’s economy and tourism industry.
Cuomo’s administration is barring a commission examining Family Court reform from publicly discussing its “confidential” deliberations — subject to a $10,000 fine.
A giant water park with indoor surfing, rock climbing and something called the “Ninja Warrior” obstacle course is slated to open on Long Island by late fall.
A judge isn’t buying claims by Rudy Giuliani pal Lev Parnas that his arrest was timed to keep him quiet about wrongdoing by President Donald Trump.
Heavy rainfall late afternoon yesterday closed roads in Rensselaer County, prompting officials to declare a state of emergency shortly before 6 p.m.
A New York federal judge nullified the suspension of horse trainer Bob Baffert, finding that NYRA acted unconstitutionally by failing to let him adequately respond to claims made against him after Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit failed a postrace drug test.
Black Lives Matter protesters took a demonstration they were holding in Saratoga Springs’ Congress Park to Broadway last night – and police responded in tactical gear to create a line forcing protesters off the main thoroughfare.
Saratoga Springs Assistant Police Chief John Catone says he let anger and frustration interfere with his intended message when he was talking about recent violence in the city.
A thoroughfare connecting two Schenectady neighborhoods will receive a major facelift after local and federal authorities stitched together a long-planned funding package.
The City of Albany is looking for more public input about how it should use part of the $80.7 million in federal funds it received under the American Rescue Plan.
Facebook said it would pay more than $1 billion to content creators on its social networks through 2022, a move that reflects the increasing value the company and its competitors see in the recorded videos, live-streams and other kinds of posts their users make.
Johnson & Johnson issued a voluntary recall for five of its sunscreen sprays after testing found low levels of benzene, a carcinogen, in the products. Consumers were told to stop using the products and throw them out.
In a striking reflection of concern over the approval of the controversial new Alzheimer’s drug Aduhelm, two major American health systems have decided that they will not administer it to patients.
The Justice Department’s inspector general released a long-awaited report that sharply criticized the F.B.I.’s handling of the sexual abuse case involving Larry Nassar, the former doctor for the U.S.A. Gymnastics national team and Michigan State sports.
A Los Angeles judge has said Britney Spears can choose her own lawyer in the fight to end her controversial conservatorship.
Spears broke down in tears in open court while she plead with the judge to remove her father from her conservatorship.
“I’m here to get rid of my dad and charge him for conservatorship abuse,” Spears said via remote video. “I want to press charges for abuse on this conservatorship today…all of it.”
Spears thanked fans on Twitter for their support following a decision by the judge overseeing her conservatorship case that she could choose her own lawyer.
Mac & cheese ice cream? Yeah, it’s a thing.
