Good Monday morning. Somehow, it’s a brand new month.
I know the weather just started to feel like spring, but in case you’re wondering, the official start of summer is 52 days away.
You’re welcome.
We are already two days into Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month (AKA: AAIP Month), which, I was a little chagrined to find out (because I hadn’t know) has been around since the late 1970s.
The idea reportedly originated with Jeanie Jew, a former Capitol Hill staffer who had approached New York Republican Rep. Frank Horton (who I had also never heard of) after witnessing the 1976 U.S. Bicentennial celebrations and noting with dismay the lack of recognition given to Asian Pacific Americans.
The oversight felt particularly person to Jew because her great-grandfather, M.Y. Lee, came to thee U.S. from China in the 1800s and helped build the transcontinental railroad. He and many others suffered significantly while contributing to a crucial development in this country’s history.
Lee became a prominent businessman, but was killed during a trip to Oregon at a time of anti-Chinese and anti-Asian sentiment- something that, tragically, we are seeing yet again today.
Horton’s first resolution that proclaimed the first 10 days in May as Pacific/Asian American Heritage Week was introduced in the upper house by Sen. Daniel Inouye. But the measures failed to pass.
The next year, Rep. Horton tried again, this time with a resolution that proposed the president should “proclaim a week, which is to include the seventh and tenth of the month, during the first ten days in May of 1979 as ‘Asian/Pacific American Heritage Week.’”
This measure was successful, passing first the House and then the Senate and ultimately getting signed into law by President Jimmy Carter. And every year, the commemoration was re-upped by various presidents, until 1990 when Congress passed a bill, signed into law by President George H.W. Bush, to expand the week into a month-long event.
It wasn’t until 1992 that still another bill was passed to officially designate the entire month of May as AAPI Heritage Month.
The month of May was chosen to commemorate the immigration of the first Japanese individual to the U.S. on May 7, 1843, (he was a 14-year-old fisherman who came via a whaling ship), and also to mark the anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869 – much of which had been constructed by Chinese immigrants.
There are, according to the Census, approximately 22.2 million Asians and 1.6 million Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islanders in the U.S.
Another day, another Google Doodle worth noting. This one commemorates Elijah McCoy, a 19th century African American inventor best known for inventing lubrication devices used to make train travel more efficient. He was born on this day in 1844.
Also, today is the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Fitr, the end of the month-long dawn-to-sunset fasting of Ramadan, which is typically marked with communal prayers, celebratory gatherings around festive meals and new clothes.
After a perfectly beautiful spring weekend, weather-wise, we’re in for some rain, which makes having to go to work easier, IMHO. It will be cloudy with periods of showers (chance of rain is 80 percent, so don’t skimp on the umbrella and boots and slicker), with temperatures in the mid-to-high-50s.
In the headlines…
The United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross began evacuating civilians from the besieged southern port city of Mariupol, and the operation will continue today.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi praised Ukrainians’ “ferocity” and promised military and financial support after leading a top-level meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv over the weekend.
Pelosi’s unannounced trip to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on Saturday, made her the most senior US official to meet with Zelensky since the war broke out more than two months ago.
“We believe that we are visiting you to say thank you for your fight for freedom…Our commitment is to be there for you until the fight is done,” Pelosi told Zelensky while they met in Kyiv, in a video released by the Ukrainian leader.
Pelosi is expected to meet with President Andrzej Duda of Poland, a key ally, today, as the United States dramatically escalates its investment in Ukraine’s war effort.
First lady Jill Biden will travel to Romania and Slovakia this week, coming within miles of the Ukrainian border, meeting members of the United States military stationed overseas, as well as top-level government officials in both countries.
The Senate this week will likely take up President Joe Biden’s request for an additional $33 billion in military aid, putting the U.S. on pace to spend more than the annual average it spent on the war in Afghanistan.
Biden wants Congress to expedite visas for Russian scientists eager to leave their country in the midst of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, an effort to accelerate a brain drain already underway and further deprive President Putin of some of Russia’s top talent.
Russia will pull out of the International Space Station (ISS) in response to international sanctions meant to punish the country for its invasion of Ukraine, state media outlets Tass and RIA Novosti reported.
Spanish tennis star Rafa Nadal said that Wimbledon’s ban on Russian and Belarusian players amid Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine is “unfair.”
As the political calendar inches towards the midterm elections in November, a run of recent polling all points to one thing: Biden has a problem with young voters.
Biden on Saturday brought a degree of normalcy back to the Washington social calendar, partaking in the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner.
Biden memorialized his “dear friend” former Vice President Walter Mondale as “one of the great giants in American history” during a service for the late pol in Minnesota yesterday.
Sen. Michael Bennet (D- Colo.) announced that he has tested positive for COVID-19, after cases among his colleagues delayed some Senate business last week.
Giant online retailer Amazon.com Inc will end its paid time-off policy for employees with COVID-19 from May 2, the company told U.S.-based staff over the weekend.
Countries are beginning to offer a fourth dose of the Covid-19 vaccine to vulnerable groups, but medical professionals are undecided on whether it would benefit the wider population.
Covid-19 was the third leading cause of death in the United States in 2021, following heart disease and cancer, for the second year in a row, according to provisional data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Hospitalizations from Covid-19 are receding, but safety-net providers are facing tremendous unmet needs from poor and uninsured patients who delayed seeking care during the pandemic.
Beijing has banned all restaurant dining, shut down Universal Studios and ordered residents to provide proof of a negative Covid test to enter public venues in a major escalation of restrictions as a five-day holiday gets underway.
Kentucky U.S. Sen. Rand Paul promised to wage a vigorous review into the origins of the coronavirus if Republicans retake the Senate and he lands a committee chairmanship.
The US should prepare for a possible summer surge of Covid-19 cases across Southern states, former White House Coronavirus Response Task Force coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx said.
As New York City continues on its path of recovery, the pandemic could be leaving a lasting imprint on how the city uses its roadways: More space for people and less room for cars.
COVID-19 rates continue to climb in the Capital Region, though the numbers are beginning to flatten out elsewhere in the state.
The CDC is now urging masks in 37 counties in New York state, all located in the Upstate New York region, due to high Covid-19 levels.
Unlike in the early days of the pandemic — or even during the recent Omicron surge — Gov. Kathy Hochul and state health officials aren’t pushing mask mandates or other restrictions.
Hochul is a grandmother.
An initial 63-page background check revealed two red flags in former LG Brian Benjamin’s past, but it failed to turn up a subpoena issued to his political campaign.
A much-anticipated bill was introduced to the state Senate late Friday night which would allow Albany Democrats to remove Benjamin from the June primary ballot.
The Legislature could vote on the bill as early as today.
Hochul announced the opening of the transformative Albany Skyway, a new elevated park reconnecting downtown Albany to the Hudson River waterfront.
Mayor Eric Adams threw personal punches at members of the media Saturday night during what’s historically supposed to be a lighthearted roast of City Hall and the Big Apple press corp.
Adams met with the 77 NYPD precinct commanders and other top brass Saturday to discuss ways to stem the city’s rising tide of crime ahead of the summer.
According to people in the meeting, many commanders thought they were going to be put on the hot seat, but that wasn’t the case.
Adams’ former political rival Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa predicts that Adams might stand out at tonight’s Met Gala as much as Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez did when she wore her “Tax the Rich” dress last year.
A mishap in the prize area of a Times Square arcade on Saturday night led to a fight between two men that ended when one pulled out a knife and stabbed the other to death, the police said.
Amazon has been granted a hearing over its claims that the successful union vote at a Staten Island facility last month was improperly carried out.
New York health authorities are investigating cases of severe hepatitis in otherwise healthy children amid what appears to be a global outbreak of pediatric liver disease without an obvious cause.
The owner of the Capital Region’s largest bus and limousine company estimates 60 percent of the stretch limo operators in the state have gone out of business since the 2018 limo crash in Schoharie that killed 20 people.
State Police are investigating Mayor Michael Stammel’s murky dealings with the now-defunct Rensselaer Volunteer Ambulance service.
Netflix has canceled development on “Pearl,” an animated series created by Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, marking the latest cost-saving moves after the company reported a disappointing first quarter.
The Judds joined the Country Music Hall of Fame yesterday, just a day after Naomi Judd died unexpectedly. Naomi’s daughters, Wynonna and Ashley Judd, accepted the honor amid tears.
Kathy Boudin, who, as a member of the radical Weather Underground of the 1960s and ’70s took part in the murderous 1981 holdup of a Brink’s armored truck and then, in prison and was freed two decades later, died at the age of 78 of cancer.
The actor Bill Murray said that a movie in which he was set to star was suspended because an attempt at humor had been taken amiss by a female co-star, addressing publicly for the first time an episode that has gotten widespread attention.
