Good Wednesday/Friday morning. Welcome to the end of this short holiday workweek.
First, a programming note: Rise and Shine will be taking a bit of a holiday hiatus. There will be no posts tomorrow (Thanksgiving) through Sunday. We’ll be back bright and early – and boy, do we mean early – on Monday, Nov. 29. And then the official Christmas countdown will be underway.
Now, as for tonight, in case you’ve forgotten, or are very far removed from your college days, it’s traditionally known as the biggest drinking/party night of the year. In fact, in some corners of the word, it’s known as “Blackout Wednesday” or “Drinksgiving.”
There’s no real hard and fast evidence for this, other than anecdotal reports of bigger-than-usual mid-week bar sales and heavier-than-usual Uber traffic, for example, but there is considerable speculation as to why people turn out in droves.
In no particular order, reasons for people partying hearty on Thanksgiving Eve include but are not limited to:
- Everyone has off for the holiday and so can sleep in and not worry about hangovers (unless they’re participating in early morning T-Day runs, or maybe they just settle for running half drunk and not going as fast as usual).
- Everyone is home for the holiday and wants to catch up with old friends – this is particularly true for the college set.
- No one wants to host a big dinner party the night before a big dinner party. (Although I have spoken to some colleagues who tell me their family traditions extend to include Thanksgiving Eve festivities).
- There’s only so much of one’s family one can take before one seeks the solace of alcohol.
- Nothing cures a hangover like a fat and carb-laden meal, though all of my experience (long ago, sadly, in a galaxy far, far away), is that grease actually works best for this.
Americans spend quite a bit on alcohol – about $579 per consumer unit annually, and if you can explain to me what that means, please go ahead. We drop the biggest chunk of that around the holidays, and not just winter holidays, mind you, but 4th of July, Mardi Gras, Cinco de Mayo and Memorial Day are up there, too.
And since I like to be the skunk at the garden party, here’s a good place for me to put in a little PSA reminder that if you’re going to be partying tonight, please do so responsibly and do NOT drink and drive.
MADD reports that the Thanksgiving holiday produces more people killed in drunk driving crashes than the Christmas holiday. It’s an especially deadly time for young people, since they tend to be out and about in higher numbers than us old fogey types.
Please people, have fun and be safe. Maybe just stay home and get a jump on that cranberry sauce? That’s what I’ll be doing.
Oh, and if you’re out and about in the Capital Region: In an effort to combat driving after alcohol consumption in downtown restaurants and bars during Thanksgiving week, three entities are collaborating on a program to provide Uber vouchers worth up to $50 for a ride home.
As for the weather, things are looking pretty good for today and tomorrow.
We’re back up into the 40s, temperature-wise, and though it will be mostly sunny today and cloudy tomorrow, there won’t be any rain until Friday morning – just in time for you Black Friday shoppers to get nice and soggy. Bring extra bags to protect your gifts.
In the headlines…
President Joe Biden announced the release of emergency oil reserves to combat high energy prices ahead of the busy holiday travel season, but it will be weeks before the barrels hit the market.
The action is focused on helping Americans coping with higher fuel and other prices ahead of holiday travel. Gasoline prices are at about $3.40 a gallon, more than 50% higher than a year ago, according to the American Automobile Association.
The move appeared to underwhelm oil traders, who had been expecting Biden to announce a larger release from America’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which is the biggest in the world with 620 million barrels.
A large portion of the barrels that will be offered from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve will likely be exported to China and India, traders said.
Biden noted this “will not solve the problem of high gas prices overnight. “It will take time, but before long, you should see the price of gas drop where you fill up your tank,” he said. “And in the longer term, we will reduce our reliance on oil as we shift to clean energy.”
Republicans were quick to slam Biden’s decision to open the taps on the nation’s oil reserves, accusing him of misusing a national security stockpile for the politically expedient goal of lowering gasoline prices just before Thanksgiving.
Biden was compared to the fictional newscaster Ron Burgundy from the movie “Anchorman” when he recited the words “end of quote” after referencing a statement from the CEO of Walmart.
Biden seemed to snub Vice President Kamala Harris as they helped prepare meals at a DC soup kitchen during their first public appearance together in more than a week.
Biden plans today to nominate Shalanda Young, the acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, to become the agency’s permanent leader after months without one, according to a person familiar with the matter.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki refused to retract comments by Biden characterizing 18-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse as a White supremacist.
Rittenhouse met with Donald Trump at the former president’s Mar-a-Lago club after the teen was acquitted of all charges in his homicide trial last week.
New Polling shows Trump beating Biden in five key swing states in a hypothetical 2024 matchup.
The poll, which was conducted for Trump’s own political action committee, finds Trump ahead in all five states, by margins ranging from 3% in Georgia to a tough-to-believe 12% in Michigan.
Trump’s yearlong campaign falsely claiming he won the 2020 election and demanding redress is turning voter fraud into a litmus test for Republicans seeking office as the party seeks to reclaim the House and Senate in 2022.
The Bidens are on Nantucket for the Thanksgiving holiday.
First Lady Jill Biden opened the holiday season at the White House by breaking off a sprig from the official Blue Room tree and giving it — and a big smooch — to her toddler grandson.
The House committee investigating the Capitol attack issued subpoenas to three militia or paramilitary groups, including the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, that investigators believe have information about the deadly siege on Jan. 6.
Jurors found the main organizers of the deadly right-wing rally in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017 liable under state law for injuries to counter-protesters, awarding more than $25 million in damages. But the jury deadlocked on two federal conspiracy charges.
The jury found that prominent alt-right leaders, including Richard Spencer, Jason Kessler and Christopher Cantwell, should pay for the demonstrations that exploded into a horrific riot injuring dozens of counterprotesters and killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer.
A federal jury in Cleveland found three of the nation’s largest pharmacy chains substantially contributed to the opioid crisis in two Ohio counties, the first time the retail segment of the drug industry has been held accountable in the decades-long epidemic.
Darrell Brooks, the Wisconsin man who was arrested and accused of driving an SUV into crowds at the Waukesha Christmas parade on Sunday, was charged with five counts of first degree intentional homicide.
Kevin Costello, the court commissioner who presided over the bail hearing, granted prosecutors’ request for $5 million bail for Brooks, as prosecutors learned of a sixth death in the incident of a 8-year-old boy.
The family of Jackson Sparks, 8, said that the brain surgery he had undergone on Sunday after the parade had failed to save him. He was one of scores of children hospitalized in the aftermath of the incident.
Low bail that led to the Brooks’ initial release after a history of arrests is prompting debates among lawmakers over bail policies in the state.
The Biden administration filed an emergency court motion that seeks the immediate reinstatement of its rules requiring many employers to ensure their workers are vaccinated or tested weekly for Covid-19.
This was supposed to be the year vaccines brought the pandemic under control. Instead, more people in the United States have died from Covid-19 this year than died last year, before vaccines were available.
Europe’s death toll from Covid will exceed two million people by next spring, the World Health Organization projected, adding that the continent remained “firmly in the grip of the Covid-19 pandemic.”
Europe’s already fragile economic recovery is at risk of being undermined by a fourth wave of coronavirus infections now dousing the continent, as governments impose increasingly stringent health restrictions to try to curb the spread of COVID-19.
New Zealand plans to allow most fully vaccinated travelers into the country by the end of April without a mandatory hotel quarantine, as it slowly emerges from what has been one of the world’s longest lockdowns.
Covid kept many people in place. Now several developed countries, facing aging labor forces and worker shortages, are racing to recruit, train and integrate foreigners.
Detroit’s three big automakers — General Motors, Ford and Chrysler parent Stellantis — announced that they are not yet mandating vaccines for thousands of workers.
The expert health panel advising Israel’s government believes that another COVID wave is on the horizon in light of waning vaccine effectiveness, and that the children’s vaccination drive would not be enough by itself to halt the pandemic.
Seven anti-vaccine doctors fell sick after gathering earlier this month for a Florida “summit” at which alternative treatments for Covid-19 were discussed.
Three health providers in Warren County put out a dire statement yesterday, begging residents to get vaccinated as doctors, nurses and other health personnel are being crushed by COVID-19 patients.
The Finger Lakes region is on the brink of a health care crisis.
Returning to a mask mandate is “not off the table” for Monroe County, according to the country executive.
FF Thompson Hospital in Canandaigua temporarily diverted patients twice last week, amid hospital bed shortages across the state.
With daily coronavirus case rates reaching record numbers and area hospitals more than 90 percent full, local officials in the Buffalo area re-instituted a mask mandate for all indoor public spaces that went into effect yesterday.
New York State is launching a $3 million grant program meant to boost new technologies that would expand and improve access to telehealth services, the use of which has become more prominent amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
Gov. Kathy Hochul pledged to get the next phase of the Second Avenue Subway underway in 2022 — calling on the Biden administration to approve the MTA’s application for federal funding after a years-long delay state officials pin on Donald Trump.
Hochul toured a long-abandoned tunnel beneath Second Ave. in East Harlem that MTA officials plan to repurpose for the second phase of the Second Ave. subway.
New York state officials have opted to renovate Penn Station without evicting upstairs neighbor Madison Square Garden because relocating it would delay the station improvements “for a generation,” acting MTA Chairman Janno Lieber said.
The state over the last three months has spent $30 million on efforts to reduce gun violence across New York by aiding outreach and intervention programs on the local level.
Hochul extended the gun violence state of emergency again as her administration continues to address what has been defined as a public health crisis.
State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins defended the state’s bail changes during an event on gun violence this week with Hochul.
The almost universal opposition to the state’s decision among tenant and landlord advocates to stop accepting pandemic rent relief applications as well as other experts represents what some see as one of the first major missteps by Hochul.
Hochul and Lt. Gov. Brian Benjamin continued to dodge questions about inaccurate information Benjamin provided for a background check before he was sworn in as Hochul’s second in command.
Mayor Bill de Blasio called for Hochul to require that MTA workers be vaccinated against COVID-19, as he declared New York City’s inoculation mandates have provided “absolute proof” they’re effective.
Hochul will not be issuing a vaccine mandate on MTA workers, in spite of de Blasio’s plea.
De Blasio welcomed the removal of a historic Jefferson statue from the Council chamber, declaring that the Founding Father’s “profoundly contradictory” beliefs on slavery means he has no place in the ornate room.
The NYC Council overwhelmingly approved the first of two proposals that could bring thousands of new homes — including many affordable ones — to relatively white and rich neighborhoods.
The largest rezoning of the de Blasio administration paves the way for more than 8,000 new apartments and a multi-million dollar public housing investment in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn.
The Council approved a controversial rezoning measure that will allow the New York Blood Center to expand its Upper East Side headquarters after a bruising battle that pitted the wealthy enclave against de Blasio and a majority of Council members.
Council members also overwhelmingly approved a slew of measures designed to reduce traffic chaos caused by trucks delivering goods purchased online.
Attorney General Letitia James is turning to the political director of a key labor union – 1199SEIU’s Gabby Seay – to lead her campaign for governor.
James announced an investigation into the Babylon School District over allegations of widespread sexual abuse and misconduct against former Babylon High School students by educators.
Westchester County Executive George Latimer, who is reportedly under consideration by James to be her LG running mate, says he’ll soon make an endorsement in the 2022 governor’s race.
Lawmakers in Albany are continuing to spar over whether to impeach former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, with much of the debate focused on whether the Legislature has the constitutional authority to remove someone who has left office.
Assemblyman Ron Kim is calling for Cuomo’s impeachment following a state report showing Cuomo used top state officials to help draft his book deal during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and was “not fully transparent” about nursing home deaths.
Two former top New York prosecutors blasted Cuomo for using government staffers to help write his $5 million book during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Here’s a timeline of how Cuomo hid the true COVID-19 death toll of nursing home residents while negotiating the rights to his book last year about the crisis that paid him a $5.1 million advance.
More than three months after he resigned in disgrace, Cuomo exists in political limbo – not completely written off as a spent force, but sidelined as the campaign to replace him heats up.
Dozens of state lawmakers skipped a hearing on the most expensive construction program in the MTA’s history.
Mayor-elect Eric Adams flew to Puerto Rico earlier this month on a bitcoin billionaire’s private jet — even as he claimed that the trip was on “my dollar, my dime and my time.”
Adams’ spokesman said that he traveled to Puerto Rico to meet with the governor and attend the Somos conference; he added that Adams paid the equivalent of a one-way trip on a private flight.
Adams sought to distance himself from a Brooklyn for-profit college president who was recently reinstated despite allegations of serial sexual misconduct as Hochul vowed an investigation into the “deeply disturbing situation.”
Adams is considering giving Stephen Scherr, Goldman Sachs’ chief financial officer, a leadership position in the new administration. He’s currently co-charing Adams’ transition team.
New York City will become the largest municipality in the country to allow legal residents to vote if the legislation is approved as expected in December.
Mujahid Abdul Halim is the one man who confessed to his role in the assassination of Malcolm X. He long insisted that the two men convicted with him were innocent.
The man convicted of a rape that took place in a Syracuse park in 1981 and was described in raw detail in the memoir “Lucky” published nearly 20 years after it occurred was exonerated.
Ghislaine Maxwell has asked the United Nations to help get her out of a Brooklyn federal jail only days before the start of her sex trafficking trial.
The Saratoga County District Attorney’s Office has offered to drop misdemeanor charges against Black Lives Matter leader Lexis Figuereo, who was charged twice with obstruction after his appearances at City Council meetings in July.
The state Department of Health has stepped in to help stabilize a nursing shortage at the 80-bed Rosewood Gardens nursing home in East Greenbush that caused local emergency management crews to intervene over the weekend.
Albany County didn’t take the top bidder when it awarded naming rights to the MVP Arena, choosing the health insurer’s $10 million, 5-year offer over a larger bid package proposed by a tech and consulting company founded by an Albany High graduate.
Martin A. Schmidt, the provost at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will be the next president at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the school’s board of trustees announced.
RIP Susan John, who represented Rochester in the New York Assembly for 20 years and was one of the state Legislature’s leading champions of rights for women and working people. She died after losing a battle to cancer at the age of 64.
The National Rifle Association said it had found additional examples of excessive benefits paid by the nonprofit gun rights organization in recent years to CEO Wayne LaPierre, including $44,000 in private jet flights, according to a new tax filing.
The Netflix employee who was a vocal advocate against Dave Chappelle’s stand-up special “The Closer,” said she has resigned from the streaming company.
Samsung has decided to build its new $17 billion computer chip factory in Texas, choosing the state over New York and Arizona.
Brian Laundrie, the sole suspect in the death of Long Island native Gabby Petito, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, a lawyer for the Laundrie family said.
