HELLO, Friday!
Today we’re going down the rabbit, I mean elephant, hole. (I know, there is no such thing; it’s called creative license. Cut me a break, OK? It’s Friday, after all).
It’s World Elephant Day, which was, according to the website, co-founded on August 12, 2012, by Canadian Patricia Sims and the Elephant Reintroduction Foundation of Thailand, an initiative of HM Queen Sirikit of Thailand.
Elephants, in case you’ve forgotten your basic elementary school learning, are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are still with us: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. These are, sadly, the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae and the order Proboscidea.
The largest of the three is the African savannah elephant, and the largest version of that species on record was an adult male who weighed about 24,000 pounds (10,886 kilograms) and was 13 feet (3.96 meters) tall at the shoulder.
African elephants have bigger ears and both males and females have tusks, very wrinkly skin and are sway-backed. Asian elephants are smaller, with dome-shaped backs, and only the males have tusks. Also, African elephants have two “fingers” at the end of their trunks, while Asian elephants have just one.
With only 40,000 to 50,000 left in the wild, elephants are classified as endangered. The greatest threat to the elephants differs. African elephants, for example, are particularly vulnerable due to the illegal ivory trade. Asian elephants, on the other hand, are most at risk from habitat loss and human-elephant conflict.
The good news: Some populations of African elephants are increasing – primarily in southern Africa. The bad news: Their numbers are still falling elsewhere, most notably in central Africa and parts of East Africa.
In case you’re interested, the World Wildlife Foundation offers the opportunity to “symbolically” adopt an elephant. For more on that click here.
An aside on elephants…going back to a moment to my political reporter roots. You’re probably aware that the Democrats’ mascot is the donkey and the GOP’s is the elephant. How did that happen? Leaving the donkey story, which is a good one, BTW, for another day, let’s focus on the Republicans because today, after all, is all about elephants.
The connection between the pachyderm and the GOP was established officially by Thomas Nash, widely credited as the father of the modern-day political cartoon, who used it in an 1874 Harper’s Weekly cartoon. Says no less an authority than The History Channel:
Titled “The Third-Term Panic,” Nast’s drawing mocked the New York Herald, which had been critical of President Ulysses Grant’s rumored bid for a third term, and portrayed various interest groups as animals, including an elephant labeled “the Republican vote,” which was shown standing at the edge of a pit. Nast employed the elephant to represent Republicans in additional cartoons during the 1870s, and by 1880 other cartoonists were using the creature to symbolize the party.
FWIW: Nast was also the brains behind the Tammany Tiger and the modern version of Santa Claus.
Another moderate late-summer day is on tap, with temperatures in the low 80s and mainly sunny skies.
In the headlines…
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland moved to make public the warrant used in the search of former President Donald Trump’s residence in Mar-a-Lago — and said he personally approved the decision after “less intrusive” attempts failed.
As remarkable as it was for the Justice Department to ask a federal judge to unseal the warrant it use to search Mar-a-Lago, the materials that prosecutors have agreed to make public are not the most informative or sensitive connected to the case.
After a federal judge gave the Justice Department a deadline to determine whether Trump supports or opposes unsealing the search warrant and property receipt used by the FBI to search Mar-a-Lago, he said he heartily supports the move.
The former president said on his social-media site that he wouldn’t oppose the release of the court documents, encouraging their “immediate release,” while adding he viewed the process as partisan.
After an hourslong standoff that closed an interstate and disrupted rural life, law enforcement officers shot and killed a man who they said tried to break into the F.B.I.’s Cincinnati office.
Biden is preparing to launch his re-election bid in the months after November’s midterm congressional elections, according to multiple aides and allies, setting up a potential 2024 re-match with Trump.
Democrats’ expected passage of their climate, healthcare and tax bill draws a clear line with Republicans headed into the midterms, with the parties now laying out competing economic visions for voters who will decide control of the House and Senate.
America’s passing of its first ever climate legislation will prove a pivotal moment in history that will help bring to an end the era of fossil fuels, according to Al Gore, the former US vice-president.
An increase in turnout among Democrats and independents and a notable shift in Republican-leaning counties contributed to the overwhelming support of abortion rights last week in traditionally conservative Kansas, according to an AP analysis of the results.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its Covid-19 community and school guidance, loosening several key recommendations.
In its new guidelines, published in the agency’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the CDC no longer recommends maintaining 6 feet of social distancing to reduce the risk of exposure.
If you were exposed to COVID-19, take three home tests instead of two to make sure you’re not infected, according to new FDA recommendations released yesterday.
This follows a new study that concludes using three home COVID tests with 48 hours between tests for those without symptoms delivers a higher degree of accuracy than two tests over three days.
Striking decreases in the stress hormone cortisol were the strongest predictor for who develops long Covid in new research that identified several potential drivers of the lingering symptoms afflicting millions of survivors.
Nearly 30% of children who were hospitalized for Covid-19 or MIS-C, a rare but serious Covid-related condition, had symptoms more than a couple of months after their diagnosis, a new study found.
Moderna’s CEO compared COVID-19 vaccines to iPhones, saying you’ll probably need to get a new version once every year.
New York City will close its municipal-run COVID-19 vaccination sites for children younger than 5 years old next week, citing a recent decrease in demand and greater availability of the shots via pediatricians and other health providers.
A group of Massachusetts politicians are calling on Gov. Charlie Baker to declare a public health emergency in response to the state’s monkeypox outbreak.
Men and women with monkeypox are sharing their stories on social media, to fight stigma and demand more action.
Tioga County (NY) Officials announced that the first case of Monkeypox in the County has been identified.
Gov. Kathy Hochul suggested the Empire State could use more migrant labor and dismissed suggestions that sanctuary city protections contributed to a growing crisis along the US border that has seen busloads of asylum seekers flood New York City.
Hochul sought to sidestep the debate over the immigration policy in New York, and focused on a push for Congress to act. “I’m not here to pass blame on a Democrat or Republican policy,” she said. “This cries out for a federal response.”
With a little less than three months until Election Day in New York, Hochul is comfortably ahead of her challenger, Long Island Rep. Lee Zeldin. But in a volatile political climate, nothing is for certain.
Biden’s popularity is sagging even further in blue-leaning New York, according to a new poll that also has Zeldin within striking distance of Hochul.
Hochul announced the distribution of $44.4 million in federal pandemic funding to help struggling New Yorkers with children to cover back-to-school and early life nutritional expenses.
Hochul signed legislation reducing the number of necessary petition signatures for school board candidates in her hometown City of Buffalo.
Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo has sued the state AG, accusing her office of wrongly rejecting his ask that the state pay for his legal counsel in a federal claim filed by a State Police investigator accused him of sexually harassing and inappropriately touching her.
In the suit, which came a year to the day after Cuomo announced his resignation, lawyer Rita Glavin alleges the denial was “arbitrary, capricious, contrary to the plain text of the statute, biased, personally and politically conflicted” and a dereliction of duty.
One year later, Cuomo still regrets resigning. Since leaving the governor’s mansion last August, he has had no fixed address. He has been on several dates, but remains single
Entrepreneurs hoping to handle New York’s first recreational cannabis sales will soon get their shot.
Citing the state’s mounting opioid overdose deaths, state Commissioner of Health Dr. Mary T. Bassett announced a standing order for naloxone, which ensures every pharmacy in the state has a steady supply of the life-saving drug.
NYC Mayor Eric Adams is ramping up pressure on the federal government to step up and assist with the surge in migrants the city is seeing – a week after Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser made a similar plea.
New York City’s Education Department is facing a logistical nightmare as the start of the school year approaches: registering potentially thousands of recently-arrived asylum-seeking kids for school in less than a month.
Adams turned away reporters, refusing to answer questions about allegedly firing an aide who raised the alarm about the handling of migrants arriving in New York City.
Adams defended Commissioner Gary Jenkins, insisting he did not hide homelessness information. “He was of the mindset that we were in compliance — which we all felt,” Adams said as he left an event in lower Manhattan. “When we weren’t, we stated it.”
One of Adams’ top aides, Frank Carone, has amassed a personal fortune that included more than $500,000 in income last year, a palatial Florida estate and at least $1.2 million worth of investments, according to a new financial disclosure.
A 14-year-old boy was fatally shot in the Bronx early yesterday. The police found the boy, whom they have identified as Jacob Borbin, with a gunshot wound to his chest. He was taken to St. Barnabas Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
The New York City Council was expected to vote on a resolution calling on Mayor Adams to restore $469 million in school budget cuts — including some the council itself voted to approve during its June budget negotiation.
An anti-discrimination bill that would ban most New York City landlords from considering criminal history in assessing tenants was reintroduced in the City Council after succumbing to resistance last year from property owners and some residents.
A Daily News freelance crime photographer found himself on the other side of the lens when he was carjacked Wednesday evening and dragged for nearly three blocks on a Manhattan street, police said.
The average rental price in Manhattan hit another all-time-high last month, as rising mortgage rates and home prices drive potential homebuyers into rentals.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler said New Yorkers will lose the only Jewish member in the House delegation if he does not win the upcoming Democratic primary for Manhattan’s newly drawn 12th congressional district.
Rep. Carolyn Maloney expressed alarm about “vaccine related health risks” for US soldiers and other military personnel, which critics say proves the congresswoman contributed to anti-vaccine hysteria and hesitancy.
Six former rivals took shots at former Mayor Bill de Blasio during a televised debate Wednesday night ahead of the Aug. 23 Democratic primary for the newly-drawn Congressional District 10 straddling lower Manhattan and brownstone Brooklyn.
State forest rangers and DEC civilian firefighters yesterday were in their fifth day of working to contain a wildfire that is impacting 5 to 6 acres of the Pharaoh Lake Wilderness Area east of Pharaoh Lake.
A federal judge ordered a summary judgment in an $8 million civil rights lawsuit, dismissing the fabrication of evidence case filed by the county Democratic elections commissioner against the ex-special Rensselaer County prosecutor in a 2009 ballot fraud probe.
Biden’s nomination of a Clifton Park attorney to fill a federal judge vacancy has a major problem — that vacancy no longer exists.
New York foaled sprinters and milers will share the Spa’s spotlight today. Six colts and geldings have been entered for the John Morrisey at six furlongs on the main track.
In a policy reversal, off-duty officers will be allowed to carry guns during the New York State Fair as long as they show their badge at the gate.
The rapid warming of the Arctic, a definitive sign of climate change, is occurring even faster than previously described, researchers in Finland said.
