Good morning, welcome to the middle of the week. It’s Wednesday.
The days are just flying by, but it’s dark when I wake up, which is dispiriting.
To be fair, though, it was dark at 3 a.m. in the middle of August, too. Just that now it gets light later, and that’s hard.
I’m thinking of investing in one of those grow lamps for humans…anyone have experience with those? Do they actually work to temper the winter doldrums? Someone fill me in.
What a great word that is, by the way, “doldrums.” The definition of it is ” state or period of inactivity, stagnation, or depression,” which is spot on. And it also reminds me of one of my favorite childhood reads, “The Phantom Tollbooth.” Loved that book.
Now that I’m done rambling, today is Navy Day, which is not to be confused with the Navy’s Birthday, celebrated on Oct. 13. Navy Day is actually the older of the too commemorations, and was originally chosen to coincide with the birthday of President Theodore Roosevelt.
For the record, the U.S. Navy was originally established as the Continental navy on Oct. 13, 1775.
That was the day that the Continental Congress authorized the procurement, fitting out, manning, and dispatch of two armed vessels to cruise in search of munitions ships supplying the British Army in America.
Both days recognize the service and sacrifices of those in uniform, but Navy Day is specifically about highlighting military service, whereas the Navy’s birthday marks the founding of that specific military branch. Navy Day was originally sponsored by the Navy League 1922, and has a New York connection: as it was that branch of the League that floated the TR birthday date.
See? All very logical.
Officially speaking, Armed Forces Day, (May 21), replaced Navy Day in 1949 by order of the first Secretary of Defense, Louis A. Johnson. But this day is unofficially recognized at the local and base level, and may include events like road races, fundraisers and more.
While this day is really for members of the active forces and reserves, as well as retirees, and dependents, it would be nice if you happen to know someone who falls into that category to take a moment to thank them for their service.
We are finally getting a reprieve from the rain. Today will simply be cloudy, with just the slight chance of a shower. Temperatures will be in the mid-50s.
Oh, and happy 117th anniversary to the NYC subway system, which opened on this day in 1904.
In the headlines…
Democrats moved to put the final touches on a deal to invest up to $2 trillion in social programs and climate policy, as they try to cap a monthslong slog to pass their economic agenda.
Democrats scrambled to determine how to pay for the spending plan as lawmakers expressed growing doubts about the feasibility of a new tax on billionaires and a proposal to make banks turn over more information about their customers’ accounts to the IRS.
As Democrats push for a compromise on their marquee domestic priority, Sen. Joe Manchin III of West Virginia, the most outspoken holdout on the plan and a crucial swing vote, has become the object of intense lobbying by his colleagues.
Senate Democrats announced a 15% minimum tax on large companies’ income, winning support from a key moderate lawmaker, as they try to generate enough money to pay for President Biden’s social-spending and climate-change agenda.
Two U.S. senators have urged Biden to waive sanctions against India over its purchase of Russia’s S-400 air defence system, saying such a punitive measure would endanger growing cooperation.
Republican lawmakers are pressuring Biden to drop or pause his vaccine requirements for federal defense contractors over fears they will compromise national security supply chains.
Biden’s plan to promote gender equity includes a proposal to eliminate cash bail for suspects, despite a rise in violent crime across the country.
Biden excoriated Virginia Republican Glenn Youngkin during his final event with Democrat Terry McAuliffe ahead of next week’s election, repeatedly comparing the gubernatorial candidate to former President Donald Trump.
Biden’s rant hit Trump on everything from his claims of election fraud, the pandemic and the Jan. 6 insurrection, to the former president’s recent attacks on former Secretary of State Colin Powell following his death.
The world’s emissions-reduction plans would allow far more global warming than targeted in the Paris climate accord, and some of the biggest emitters, including the U.S., aren’t on track to hit their pollution targets, according to a report from the United Nations.
Advised by doctors to rest, Queen Elizabeth II, at age 95 the oldest and longest-serving monarch in British history, will not attend the global climate summit to be held in Glasgow, Scotland, starting next week, Buckingham Palace said.
A panel of U.S. health advisers endorsed kid-size doses of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine, moving the U.S. closer to beginning vaccinations in children ages 5 to 11.
The endorsement by the agency’s Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee will now be considered by the FDA, which could issue a final decision within days. The vote was nearly unanimous, with 17 members backing it and one abstention.
Pfizer has cut its vaccine to one-third of the adult dose for the children under 12 and said clinical trials showed this lower dose protected children well against symptomatic infection. The hope is it will cause fewer side-effects.
As U.S. officials prepare to expand Covid vaccine eligibility to children ages 5 to 11, the Mexican government has resisted calls to vaccinate youths, despite a court order that it do so.
People with certain health conditions that make them moderately or severely immunocompromised may get a fourth mRNA Covid-19 shot, according to updated guidelines from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
For immunocompromised people, the third COVID-19 vaccine shot is classified as an “additional dose” by the CDC, and the volume given is the same as that of the first two shots.
Even in parts of the country where COVID-19 isn’t overwhelming the health system, patients are showing up to the ER sicker than they were before the pandemic, their diseases more advanced and in need of more complicated care.
Financial incentives, public-health messages and other tactics used to encourage people to get the Covid-19 vaccine didn’t have a noticeable impact on vaccination rates among those who already were hesitant about getting the shot, new research shows.
Deborah Birx, the White House COVID-19 response coordinator under Trump, told a House subcommittee that the Trump administration could have prevented tens of thousands of deaths during the early stages of the pandemic.
Trump’s hand-picked coronavirus adviser, Scott Atlas, had rapidly consolidated power on a platform that downplayed the seriousness of Covid to most Americans, squeezing out Birx and other top government health officials.
Gov. John Bel Edwards of Louisiana lifted the state’s indoor mask mandate for at least the next four weeks.
Pilots who have refused to receive the coronavirus vaccine have cost United Airlines millions of dollars in paid leave, according to recently filed court documents.
A menacing early season nor’easter battered the New York City area, as heavy rains, strong winds and the threat of flash floods arrived in a region already scarred by deadly extreme weather this summer.
Gov. Kathy Hochul had declared a State Disaster Emergency Monday evening, before predicted heavy rain is expected to hit the tri-state area through this morning.
With Hochul’s re-election run just one year out, landlord groups foresee the governor — a western New York moderate — working to align with the left on housing, a shift that could push through tenant advocates’ holy grail: good cause eviction.
The Democratic primary for state attorney general could be one of the most interesting or boring races of 2022. It all depends on whether state Attorney General Letitia James runs for governor.
Long Island Rep. Lee Zeldin, a GOP candidate for governor, took aim at Stony Brook University Hospital for issuing letters to nurses and others who declined to be vaccinated that accuse those employees of misconduct, insubordination and dereliction of duties.
New York City’s sleepy mayoral race briefly jolted awake last night, as the second and final TV debate between Eric Adams and Curtis Sliwa devolved into a verbal fistfight.
The televised confrontation a week before Election Day seemed unlikely to change the dynamics of the race.
Sliwa again labeled Adams as Mayor Bill de Blasio’s “teammate” and the Brooklyn borough president scoffed at his opponent’s “clown-like” behavior.
Other than a moment in which he reprimanded Sliwa for behaving like a 4-year-old, Adams didn’t rise to any of his opponents’ taunts. “Show some discipline so we can get to all of these issues,” he told Sliwa. “You’re interrupting, you’re being disrespectful.”
When asked near the end of their debate to say something nice about each other, Adams admired Sliwa’s dedication to saving cats and Sliwa praised Adams for choosing not to eat animals.
Sliwa is making animal welfare a central part of his campaign. He released a “13-Point Animal Welfare Plan” last week that includes creating a “no-kill” shelter system and ending the horse carriage industry.
In one of the strangest moments of the debate, Sliwa falsely said that Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez, a Democrat from Washington Heights who is originally from the Dominican Republic, was not an American citizen.
Adams backs de Blasio’s decision to require nearly all of the city’s 300,000 municipal workers to have at least one dose of a vaccine by Nov. 1 — with a caveat that unions should have been asked to weigh in first.
Adams said that he wants to “collaborate” with “top gang members” — some of whom have apparently been charged with murder — to rein in gun violence in the city.
New York City’s likely next mayor has a Giuliani-like streak to him—and even allies wonder if he’s up for the job. “I fear he’s in over his head,” one predicts.
One of the officers who wrestled Eric Garner to the ground during his fatal 2014 arrest testified to falsely charging the Staten Island dad with a felony after riding with his lifeless body in an ambulance.
The New York City health department is “moving aggressively” to green-light a long-stalled pilot program to open at least twosupervised injection facilities aimed at reducing overdose deaths, according to four people with knowledge of the plan.
David Gilbert, 77, a participant in the politically motivated ambush of a Brink’s armored car in 1981 that left two police officers and a guard dead, has been granted parole after spending 40 years in prison for his role in the armed attack, officials said.
Gilbert was originally sentenced to 75 years to life in prison, but he became eligible for parole after his sentence was shortened by then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo in August, hours before he left office amid a sexual harassment scandal.
After a series of homicides involving children, New York City said it would make changes to improve coordination between the police and the child welfare agency.
Campaign committees for Rep. Adriano Espaillat have paid nearly $15,000 to bloggers for posting hundreds of flattering articles dating to his first run for Congress in 2016, Federal Election Commission filings show.
Several of New York’s medical cannabis dispensaries yesterday began selling smokable “whole flower,” the bud of the cannabis plant, for the first time since the Compassionate Care Act passed in 2014 to legalize marijuana for certain medical uses.
The head of the state’s Cannabis Control Board has declared that businesses that are giving away marijuana as a promotion with the purchase of an overpriced T-shirt, lighter or other item are breaking the law.
That familiar plate of Freihofer’s chocolate chip cookies that goes so well with a glass of cold milk is going to have to wait for Capital Region residents — it’s been washed away until sometime next month by Hurricane Ida.
Citing a “strained and adversarial” relationship with the board of trustees, Larry Woolbright shocked fellow lawmakers on Monday night when he resigned as mayor of the Village of Ballston Spa.
To make up for what the state described as years of pollution violations, a Waterford-based chemical manufacturer will spend $925,000 on projects for the town of Waterford and build a pavilion in Halfmoon.
Byron Brown has widened his lead on India Walton in the race for Buffalo mayor to more than 17 points, according to a new WIVB/Emerson College poll released one week before Election Day.
Walton has apologized for a 2020 comment made on a Buffalo Common Councilmember’s Facebook post.
Elli Lily & Co. has begun asking U.S. health regulators to approve a new treatment for early-stage Alzheimer’s disease, hoping for a rare victory against a disease that has proved difficult for the pharmaceutical industry to tackle.
The Santa Fe County district attorney said she was not ruling out criminal charges in last week’s fatal shooting on a film set that involved actor Alec Baldwin.
The account of the fatal shooting on the movie set of “Rust” in affidavits prepared by the Santa Fe County Sheriff’s Office suggests that some industry-standard safety precautions weren’t followed, say film-weapons experts and industry veterans.
The congressional delegation from Minnesota hopes to honor Prince, the late music superstar, with one of the nation’s highest civilian honors.
RIP Mort Sahl, the comedian who transformed the art by diving headfirst into political satire, who has died at the age of 94.
An Illinois resident is seeking at least $5 million after claiming that Kellogg’s Pop-Tarts are misrepresented by the company as a healthy food instead of the sugary indulgence they’re known to be.
