Good Wednesday morning.
I think we can all do with a little bit of a more uplifting start to the day, and so without ado, I bring you…
International Guide Dog Day! Observed on the last Wednesday in April, this day celebrates assistance canines, which are trained to help individuals with a wide range of disabilities.
Perhaps the best know use of a guide dog is to help those who are specifically trained to lead blind and visually impaired people, helping them navigate situations or obstacles that they might not be able to tackle on their own.
These dogs need to undergo intense training – either by an organization or an individual. In turn, owners need to get trained themselves, learning how to give their dog different commands for when traveling out and about.
Breeds typically used for guides include Golden Retrievers, Labradors, Labrador Retrievers, German Shepherds, Poodles and Labradoodles (those last two often for people who are allergic). The preferred breeds are those that have a combination of intelligence and temperament necessary to perform at unusually high levels.
A fairly small percentage of those who are visually impaired use guide dogs – roughly 2 to 5 percent, according to my Googling. It really depends on a number of factors – including whether someone actually likes dogs and wants to shoulder the added responsibility of caring for one.
I’ve not been able to find any precise numbers about how many guide dog teams are working in the U.S. right now. Somewhere between 10,000 and 15,000 nationwide seems to be the best guess.
One of the most frequently asked questions that I have come across is whether it’s OK to pet a working dog. The answer is generally, no. (You can tell if the dog is working if it’s wearing a harness, and sometimes even a sign or a vest that designates it as such). Petting or trying to feed a guide dog can put both the dog and its owner in danger. Just take a hard pass there.
If you believe the interwebs, guide dogs have been around for centuries. Paintings of what appears to be guide dogs being used to help the blind were uncovered during the excavations of Pompeii, Italy.
In the 1800s, British lawmakers exempted license fees for “shepherds’ dogs and “those kept by the blind as guides,” but organized and formalized training of guide dogs did not begin until the 1900s. In 1934, the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association was established in the United Kingdom. A number of training schools and foundations all seemed to pop up around the same time.
Though European countries (especially Germany) used guide dogs in particular to assist veterans who lost their sight while fighting in WWI, (the use of poison has resulted in many soldiers returning home with vision impairment), it seems that in the U.S. the practice of connecting dogs with vets did not really take off until the 1920s.
It’s going to be on the cooler side today, with temperatures in the low 50s. It will be partly cloudy with gusty wind in the afternoon.
In the headlines…
President Joe Biden announced that he pardoned three people who have “demonstrated a commitment to rehabilitation,” including 86-year-old Abraham W. Bolden Sr., who was the first Black Secret Service agent to serve on a presidential detail.
The president also commuted the sentences of 75 people who are currently serving long sentences for non-violent drug offenses.
These were Biden’s first grants of clemency since taking office. Fifty-eight of the 75 sentence commutations are set to take effect in 2023, with most of those recipients technically under house arrest until then.
Prominent Democrats and friends and family of Madeleine Albright will gather this morning at Washington National Cathedral to celebrate the life of the nation’s first secretary of state who rose from an immigrant to a trailblazing diplomat and icon.
Biden hinted this week that he is open to forgiving some student loan debt.
Some advocates believe Biden’s repeated extensions of the repayment pause, now set to end Aug. 31, could force his hand on loan forgiveness.
In yet another rollback of a Trump-era policy, Biden’s Department of Energy finalized a new efficiency rule to phase out older, high-energy incandescent light bulbs.
Russia’s gas supplies to Poland and Bulgaria were halted today with Moscow’s state gas giant Gazprom telling them that supplies would only resume if and when they paid for the gas in Russian rubles.
Russia pounded eastern and southern Ukraine as the U.S. promised to “keep moving heaven and earth” to get Kyiv the weapons it needs to repel the new offensive, despite Moscow’s warnings that such support could trigger a wider war.
Local officials in Russian districts bordering Ukraine reported overnight blasts early today, one of them appearing to strike an ammunition depot, raising the specter of broader conflict spilling beyond Ukraine’s borders.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken forcefully pushed back when GOP Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky pointed out Ukraine and Georgia were once part of the Soviet Union as Paul appeared to raise Moscow’s alleged rationale about the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The war in Ukraine is set to cause the “largest commodity shock” since the 1970s, the World Bank has warned. In a new forecast, it said disruption caused by the conflict would contribute to huge price rises for goods ranging from natural gas to wheat and cotton.
Close to 75 percent of Americans back the United States assisting in supplying weapons to Ukraine, according to a new poll.
Vice President Kamala Harris has tested positive for COVID-19, her office announced.
“I have no symptoms, and I will continue to isolate and follow CDC guidelines,” Harris wrote on Twitter. “I’m grateful to be both vaccinated and boosted.”
A Harris spokesperson said the vice president has not been a close contact to the President or First Lady due to their respective recent travel schedules.
Harris has been prescribed and has taken Paxlovid, an antiviral pill used to treat COVID-19.
The White House announced new steps to expand access to Paxlovid, the Covid-19 antiviral pill. But experts say that efforts to reach at-risk Americans remain complex and inefficient.
A trio of positive coronavirus tests scrambled the Senate schedule yesterday, as Democrats lost the votes they needed to advance multiple nominees this week in an evenly divided Senate.
The FDA has not yet cleared a coronavirus vaccine for children under 5 because the vaccine manufacturers have not finished their applications for authorization to distribute doses, a top official at the agency suggested.
Most people in the United States, including most children, have now been infected with the coronavirus, according to a new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
With just 17 legislative session days remaining in Albany, state lawmakers are showing reluctance to help Gov. Kathy Hochul deliver on her agenda ahead of the June Democratic primary, even as poll numbers show her struggling to get traction with voters.
Hochul is urging state lawmakers to help boot her embattled former Lt. Gov. Brian Benjamin off the Democratic ballot in the upcoming June 28 Democratic primary.
“The law is the law until it’s changed, and let’s just talk about how much sense it makes right now to have the law changed,” Hochul said after receiving the endorsement of the state nurses union. “I’m asking the legislators to do just that.”
New York State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart Cousins confirmed the governor called her Monday night to discuss the change.
State lawmakers have just 19 session days to settle outstanding policy items not already addressed in the budget.
The state Senate approved the Adult Survivors Act, the second year in a row lawmakers have attempted to open a legal lookback window and allow adult survivors of sex crimes to hold abusers accountable.
Ithaca Democratic Assemblywoman Anna Kelles is battling bitcoin supporters as she defends a bill that would place a two-year moratorium on crypto mining in New York.
Hochul announced the creation of the State Office of Strategic Workforce Development, which will be charged with improving the State’s workforce development programs and practices to better align with the needs and priorities of today’s employers.
New York Democrats made a last-ditch appeal to the state’s highest court to overturn a pair of lower-court rulings and salvage newly drawn congressional districts that overwhelmingly favor their party.
In his first State of the City address, Mayor Eric Adams acknowledged the immense challenges the city is facing after two years of disruption and devastation from the pandemic, saying that New York was “still in a time of profound concern.”
Adams emphasized that he planned to focus on public safety and inequality as keys to the city’s comeback after the pandemic, outlining a hopeful vision for the future.
Adams is tired of seeing NYPD officers on their phones at subway stations — and is asking New Yorkers to snap a picture when they see it happening.
Adams laid out his $99.7 billion executive budget proposal in his first “State of The City” address in which he celebrated the city’s resilience amid the COVID-19 pandemic and a wave of shocking crimes.
Adams’ executive budget, which is the product of weeks of negotiations with the City Council, proposes to grow overall city spending by $1.2 billion as compared to the $98.5 billion preliminary budget blueprint he released in February.
The budget includes additional funding for social programs, education, parks, support for immigrant New Yorkers but also – contrary to his initial pledge – more spending on the NYPD.
The mayor’s spending plan would increase the Police Department’s annual budget from the $5.4 billion authorized by lawmakers to $5.6 billion and spending on the Department of Homeless Services would rise from $2.2 billion to $2.3 billion.
A “blue ribbon panel” made up of “distinguished New Yorkers” will advise the MTA on how to crack down on fare evasion, the agency’s chairman, Janno Lieber, announced.
A former top editor at the New York Post has settled her blockbuster sexual harassment lawsuit against the tabloid and its former editor-in-chief. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.
Former President Donald Trump is on the hook for daily $10,000 fines starting yesterday after a judge held him in civil contempt for not complying with a court order to answer Attorney General Letitia James’ subpoena for documents.
Not so fast with the talk of a federal takeover of Rikers Island and New York City’s other jails, the city correction commissioner said as he promised to fix the lockups’ problems despite years of city government neglect.
The number of complaints about dog feces festering on city sidewalks has been soaring in recent weeks, especially on Manhattan’s West Side. Sanitation police are launching an effort to catch negligent dog owners in the act of failing to clean up after their pets.
The number of antisemitic incidents in New York increased by 24 percent last year to the highest level in decades, including a surge in the number of assaults, according to an annual report released on Tuesday by the Anti-Defamation League.
The Joint Commission on Public Ethics has tapped a white-shoe law firm to represent them in a last-minute bid to stay solvent just weeks before they are expected to go out of business.
Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo was spotted out on the town with a “blond mystery woman” and a group of friends until 1 a.m. Saturday.
A medical helicopter pilot and flight instructor were killed in a crash during a training flight in western New York, according to state police and the transport company.
New York’s cannabinoid hemp industry, which produces and sells items like the CBD oils and salves that a growing number of the state’s residents use to calm anxiety or aid sleep, is facing stricter packaging, labeling and testing requirements starting this week.
The New York State Public High School Athletic Association reversed its position regarding athletes wearing hair beads after a firestorm erupted inside Section II track circles on the subject Sunday and Monday.
Officials will move forward with a plan to combat invasive Eurasian watermilfoil in Lake George with an aquatic herbicide, overruling public concerns about potential long-term harm to human health and the lake ecosystem.
The National Labor Relations Board is investigating alleged labor law violations by Local 301, the union that represents blue-collar workers at General Electric Co.’s steam turbine plant in Schenectady.
Ruth’s Chris Steak House, a 57-year-old chain of about 150 upscale restaurants in 27 states, is seeking to develop its first Capital Region location in the former Romano’s Macaroni Grill building at 1 Metro Park Rd. in the chain-heavy Wolf Road corridor.
Catskill Regional Off-Track Betting Corporation board members dismissed the findings of a recently released 2018 state inspector general’s report that said their longtime president mismanaged the public corporation now flirting with bankruptcy.
Harvard University is committing $100 million for an endowed “Legacy of Slavery Fund.” Its report carefully avoided treading on direct financial reparations for descendants of enslaved people.
Dean Baquet, who got his start in journalism at local newspapers and made his name as an investigative reporter, will lead a new local investigative journalism fellowship program at The New York Times when he steps down after eight years as executive editor.
Elon Musk took to Twitter to address the increasing backlash to news that he’d finalized a deal to buy the microblogging platform.
Musk has pledged to adopt a more hands-off approach to speech on Twitter, but a warning from a top European regulator shows it may not be as simple as shelling out $44 billion for the social-media platform and taking it private.
