Good Thursday morning.
Boy, is it hot. I mean it is HOT, like potentially record-breaking, historically hot here in the Capital Region. And in case you hadn’t heard, we are not alone in our sticky, sweaty suffering.
For the first time on record, temperatures in Britain hit 104 Fahrenheit yesterday, the result of a heat wave that is leaving a trail of raging wildfires, lost lives and evacuated homes Europe – a country ill-equipped to cope with the new reality of extreme weather.
In France, two wildfires, with flames fanned by the heat, have ravaged nearly 80 square miles of forests, forcing 37,000 people to evacuate. Other blazes have occurred in Greece, Portugal and Spain.
Meanwhile, here in the U.S., dangerous heat is continuing to impact a large portion of the country, with more than 100 million people under excessive heat warnings or heat advisories, according to the Weather Prediction Center said.
Heat alerts covered more than 20 states yesterday and today across the Southern Plains and parts of the Northeast, and temperatures will soar above 20 degrees for 60 million people over the next week. All told, more than 80 percent of the US population – around 265 million people – will see a high above 90 degrees over the next seven days.
The Texas electric grid is under serious strain. The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT, which runs the Lone Star State grid) has set multiple unofficial records, and more or less begging residents and business to conserve where and when they can to avoid blackouts.
In New York, where we are trying to transition away from fossil fuels and onto renewables (much less reliable, but, of course, far cleaner) and not long ago took one of our largest power producers – the Indian Point nuclear plant – offline, the heat is testing the viability of our own electric grid.
The work-from-home phenomenon has been a particular challenge for downstate utilities, as it shifted power usage patters considerably.
Energy policy is incredibly complex and can be confusing, but it’s also very important.
Soaring gas prices, inflation, the Ukraine, more extreme weather than experts predicted, slow battery storage development, and a host of other factors have all combined to complicate the transition away from traditional fuel – which, by the way, everyone agrees we must do, but, at the same time, no one wants to live in the dark, either.
I could probably go on for quite a while on this topic, but I’m probably losing readers by the second here. Suffice to say that you really should be paying attention to the news when it comes to the future of the planet and how we fuel it. We all could stand to be better educated on that particular topic.
Of course, there is so much in the world to get educated about, and so many things I don’t know. For example, I had no idea – until this very moment – what a lamington is, or that it has its very own national day (today, FWIW).
A lamington is an Australian snack/dessert made from squares of butter or sponge cake that is coated in a layer of chocolate sauce and rolled in desiccated coconut. Some versions gild the lily by adding a layer of flavored cream or jam. Apparently, though this treat is associated with Australia, as mentioned, it was actually invented in New Zealand, where it was known as a Wellington.
Regardless of who is entitled to the bragging rights on creating this morsel, it sounds delicious, and if you know where I can find one stateside, please do advise.
The heat advisory remains in effect until 8 p.m. tonight, with heat index values of up to 99 possible. Also, there’s a potential for severe thunderstorms…as if the heat wasn’t enough to worry about. It looks like those will be starting up in the late morning and lasting through the afternoon. Also, it appears the heat will persist through the weekend, so stock up on ice if you can.
Headlines…
President Biden, who has expressed reluctance to take executive action to get around Congress, is coming under pressure by Democratic lawmakers and activists to make greater use of an authority some have been skeptical of: emergency powers.
Biden announced new executive steps to combat climate change, but fell short of issuing a climate-emergency declaration as some Democrats have called for amid stalled negotiations over major environmental legislation in Washington.
Speaking under beating sun at a defunct coal power plant in Massachusetts, Biden announced $2.3 billion in new funding for communities facing extreme heat and new steps to boost the offshore wind industry.
“Climate change poses an existential threat to the U.S. and the world,” Biden said at a former coal-fired power plant in Somerset, MA that is being renovated into a substation for the transmission of offshore wind power.
Biden said that he has cancer, forcing the White House press office to quickly clarify that he was referring to skin cancer treatment that he had before taking office last year.
House Republicans are planning to bombard Biden’s administration with investigations next year, from Hunter Biden to the border to the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
The federal investigation into Hunter Biden’s business activities is nearing a critical juncture as investigators weigh possible charges and prosecutors confront Justice Department guidelines to generally avoid bringing politically sensitive cases close to an election.
The vast majority of Hispanics are unhappy with President Biden’s overall job performance, and their dissatisfaction extends to a suite of issues including the economy, foreign policy, gun violence, and the handling of Russia-Ukraine crisis, a new Q poll finds.
Overall, Just 31% of American adults said they approve of the way Biden is handling his job, while 60% disapproved of it.
Biden plans to speak with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, by the end of the month at a moment of simmering tensions between the countries over Taiwan and trade.
“I think I’ll be talking to President Xi within the next 10 days,” Biden told reporters as he returned from his climate-related trip to Massachusetts.
Biden will visit Tampa and Orlando on Monday, marking the second high-profile White House visit to Florida within the month. Vice President Kamala Harris visited the same two cities last week.
A bipartisan group of senators proposed new legislation to modernize the 135-year-old Electoral Count Act, working to overhaul a law that ex-President Donald Trump tried to abuse on Jan. 6, 2021, to interfere with Congress’s certification of his election defeat.
The legislation was the result of months of negotiations between Republicans and Democrats eager to make changes to the 1887 law to eliminate uncertainty regarding the electoral process.
At each moment when Trump could have soothed an agitated nation, he escalated tensions instead, the House Jan. 6 committee has illustrated through its presentation of 18 live witnesses, scores of videotaped depositions and vast documentary evidence.
A former ambassador who served under Trump says the Jan. 6 committee hearings are having a “corrosive effect” and are “undoubtedly starting to take a toll” on the former president’s support.
A Democratic super PAC filed a lawsuit against the Federal Election Commission, seeking to force officials to take action against Trump for all but running for president in 2024 without having declared himself a candidate.
Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said Trump called him last week as part of a fresh effort to decertify the state’s 2020 presidential election results.
A new stash of documents obtained by Congress confirmed that the Trump administration pushed to add a citizenship question to the census to help Republicans win elections, not to protect people’s voting rights, a House committee report concluded.
A Georgia judge ordered Rudy Giuliani to testify in Atlanta next month in an ongoing criminal investigation into election interference by Trump and his advisers and allies, according to court filings released yesterday.
A-listers from near and far crowded a Manhattan church yesterday for the funeral of socialite and businesswoman Ivana Trump, who died last week after a fall down the stairs of her Upper East Side townhouse.
Ivana Trump was remembered as “a force of nature” and “the embodiment of the American dream”.
The Trump Organization had handled the funeral arrangements, and the coffin had a gold hue. The Secret Service stood by.
Georgia’s ban on most abortions after around six weeks of pregnancy took effect after a federal appeals court cleared the way for the 2019 law to be enforced.
AG Merrick Garland threatened to sue states that have outlawed or restricted abortion and said the Justice Department would ask a judge to toss a Texas lawsuit seeking to block federal rules requiring doctors to perform emergency abortions.
The Biden administration is creating a new division within the Department of Health and Human Services to coordinate the nation’s response to pandemic threats and other health emergencies.
The rapid evolution of Covid into an alphabet soup of subvariants presents a vexing challenge to health officials: They must make far-reaching policy decisions based on little biological certainty of which viral variants will be dominant this fall or winter.
If you haven’t gotten your Covid booster shot yet, public health experts say BA.5 is a prime reason to get it — and soon.
According to the American Heart Association (Heart.org), Americans have been delaying regular health screenings for an assortment of non-COVID-related issues, including blood pressure, diabetes and heart disease.
COVID-19 cases are continuing to surge in New York City and unvaccinated residents are bearing the brunt.
Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that, as of Wednesday, the Big Apple has a seven-day case rate of 369.8 per 100,000, the second-highest rate in the United States, only behind California.
Gov Kathy Hochul initiated an independent probe of the Cuomo administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic — but even preliminary results aren’t expected until after the November elections.
Hochul said that she did not anticipate schoolchildren would need to wear masks when they return to school in September, but that she was keeping the statewide mask mandate on public transportation for now.
“We need to be cognizant of what could be our future,” the governor said during a Manhattan press conference. “If anything, this pandemic, COVID, has taught us that preparations are the key to, literally, survival.”
The New York State Democratic Party is demanding the Congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection extend its probe to include GOP Rep. Lee Zeldin, who’s running against Hochul in this year’s gubernatorial race.
Hochul, who once had the support of the NRA, was endorsed by Brady PAC, a campaign arm of the gun control group Brady, as she works to retain her seat and rebuff a November general election challenge from Zeldin.
Hochul insisted her use of state aircraft was appropriate, huffing that, “a governor is allowed to go home” in response to a question about The Post’s analysis of more than 140 taxpayer-funded trips, including a September flight to watch a Buffalo Bills game.
The MTA is chugging ahead with Hochul’s plan to redevelop Penn Station, adding another mega-project to the transit agency’s cash-strapped portfolio.
Early voting for state Senate races begins Aug. 13 ahead of the primary election on Aug. 23, and in an election cycle shaken up by redistricting, new candidates look to take advantage of the new lines to unseat incumbents, while others are vying to fill open seats.
A former legislative aide who was fired in 2018 after she went public with sexual harassment allegations against a supervisor sued the Senate, Hochul and the man she accused of subjecting her to years of abuse, including drugging and raping her multiple times.
In New York, private nonprofit hospitals are going to extraordinary lengths to recover unpaid debts from their patients – including taking a chunk out of their wages.
A package of measures signed into law by Hochul are meant to improve services for victims and survivors of human trafficking, as well as bolster training.
The majority of New York state agencies have revamped their domestic violence prevention practices and appointed a liaison to comply with an executive order months ahead of schedule, according to a report released by the state inspector general’s office.
Mayor Eric Adams and the New York City Council are “very close” on a deal to alleviate an expected $250 million in school budget cuts using funds already allocated to the Department of Education.
Adams announced that dozens of additional New York City buildings will lower their energy use due to the impending heatwave with 90-degree temperatures expected throughout the week.
A relative of the man knifed to death by a Harlem bodega worker who won’t face murder charges was outraged by Adams’ frequent comments about the high-profile case.
Jose Alba may be free of his murder case, but the wrongfully charged Manhattan bodega worker told The NY Post that he is still too traumatized to leave his house.
A 14-year-old boy has died after being shot in the head on a Harlem street on Tuesday afternoon in what appeared to be a targeted attack, the police said. A 15-year-old boy who was with him was also shot in the leg and was in stable condition.
A bizarre video of a shark frolicking just off Rockaway Beach surfaced on social media as New Yorkers looking to beat the heat returned to the ocean.
A dead great white shark washed up on a Long Island beach yesterday morning amid a rash of recent attacks and sightings in nearby waters, authorities said.
Humpback whales are not only returning to New York City waters to feed every year, but are staying for longer periods of time, a Rutgers University study has revealed.
Two Bronx residents landed in the hospital for weeks after getting Legionnaires’ disease during a deadly outbreak in May, and they blame the owner of a building for not properly maintaining the water-cooling system that infected them, new court papers show.
New York state Health Commissioner Dr. Mary Bassett said officials foresee the monkeypox virus to continue to spread as reported cases begin to pop up more in the upstate region, whereas the brunt of cases have so far been in New York City.
Rep. Carolyn Maloney wants answers from the Biden administration on its handling of monkeypox, focusing on its testing and vaccination strategy and how it plans to address the disproportionate impact the virus is having on the LGBTQ community.
The chief lawyer for the Office of Cannabis Management has abruptly left the agency while it is in the middle of rolling out regulations and guidance for the emerging state marijuana market.
An out-of-control blimp made an emergency landing at a State University of New York campus in Westchester yesterday morning — but nobody in the aircraft or at the college was injured, officials said.
The Port of Albany’s offshore wind tower turbine project has fallen months behind on its aggressive two-year construction schedule as it awaits needed permits from both the state and federal governments.
The Bryce Companies has submitted a new plan for redeveloping the Troy Atrium by knocking down the Uncle Sam Mall portion of the downtown site and building a five-story building with 100 apartment units.
It’s been several years in the making, but it appears that construction on Quackenbush Square, the $100 million mixed-use development in downtown Albany by Syracuse-based Pioneer Cos. is in full swing.
Two months after 10 were killed at Tops Friendly Market in Buffalo, the supermarket has reopened and employees and Masten Park residents confront the pain of returning and remembering.
As the nation grapples with how to prevent mass shootings, Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown told lawmakers on Capitol Hill about the harm those tragedies inflict on communities.
