Good Wednesday morning, and welcome to the last day of November.
I don’t know about you, but even though I’m more than a bit Grinchy when it comes to the holidays, it’s hard for me not to feel a little tingly and warm if I happen to be in the vicinity of Rockefeller Center around this time of year.
There is really something magical about all the decorations and watching people skate and bustle about with their packages, and of course, the coup de grace – the holiday tree.
The tradition of the Rockefeller Center tree dates back to the 1930s, at the height of the Great Depression.
Legend has it that construction workers at the Center pooled their resources to purchase a 20-foot Balsam fir, which was adorned with garlands handmade by their respective families, in an effort to lift everyone’s spirits at a rather dark time when people didn’t have a lot to he hopeful for.
The official tree lighting ceremony, which has become a hallmark of the season in NYC, didn’t become an official thing until 1933. But it has taken place at the plaza between West 48th and West 51st streets and Fifth and Sixth avenues one week after Thanksgiving every year since then.
NBC has hosted a national broadcast of the ceremony since 1951, and the event is free and open to the public on a first come, first-served basis. Millions of people show up to see the tree, which is on display well into the new year.
No longer a humble Balsam, the typical Rockefeller tree is a Norwegian Spruce that stands between 60 to 100 feet tall. It is adorned with miles of LED lights (reportedly more than 50,000) and many, many ornaments, and since 2018 has been topped by a 70-spike star that weighs 900 pounds and is made of 3 million Swarovski crystals – some of which were hand-tweezed into place.
The task of locating the tree – no small feat – falls to the Rockefeller Center gardener. The tree is usually donated and makes its big debut sometime in the mid-to-late-fall.
“What I look for is a tree you would want in your living room, but on a grander scale,” Erik Pauze, the head gardener, told Rockefeller Magazine in 2021. “It’s got that nice, perfect shape all around. And most of all, it’s gotta look good for those kids who turn the corner at 30 Rock; it needs to instantly put a huge smile on their faces. It needs to evoke that feeling of happiness.”
This year’s tree has an upstate provenance. It’s an 82-feet-tall, 50-foot-wide Norway Spruce that weighs 14 tons and hails from Queensbury. Its estimated age is 85 to 90 years.
After it has done its turn in the spotlight, the Rockefeller tree has a new lease on life as lumber, which since 2007, has been donated to Habitat to Humanity.
The 90th annual tree lighting ceremony will take place tonight at 8 p.m. ET. Lots of stars – including the Radio City Rockettes, of course, as well as Gwen Stefani, Alicia Keys, Blake Shelton and others – will be on hand for the festivities. It will be airing live as part of NBC’s two-hour special,”Christmas in Rockefeller Center.”
If you happen to be traveling to the city for the big event, you might need an umbrella, but not a heavy coat. Temperatures are expected to be in the 60s (!) It’s going to rain for much of the day, but currently hourly forecast looks like that will clear up in time for the 8 p.m. ceremony. Be prepared just in case.
Here in Albany, we’re also in for a cloudy and very windy day, with temperatures in the mid-50s. Wind gusts of 50 mph or more could blow across Upstate, leading to scattered power outages and sending Christmas decorations into the neighbor’s yard.
In the headlines…
Senators passed legislation cementing federal protections for same-sex marriage, a historic step that follows months of bipartisan negotiations and puts the landmark bill just steps away from becoming law.
The Senate passed the Respect for Marriage Act in a 61-36 vote, with 12 Republicans joining forces with all Democrats present to advance the bill across the Capitol complex. The measure required 60 votes to pass.
Democratic and Republican leaders in Congress vowed to pass legislation averting a nationwide rail strike, saying they agree with Biden that a work stoppage during the winter holidays would disrupt shipping and deal a devastating blow to the nation’s economy.
President Biden knew he would be risking a backlash from his labor allies if he stepped in to head off a holiday-season rail strike But the dangers a strike would pose to the U.S. economy and Americans’ health and safety proved too great.
Progressives have cooled on the idea of finding a new leader to seek the party’s presidential nomination in 2024, marveling at the successes of the midterms and crediting Biden for once again surpassing expectations.
With Biden and party officials looking toward the 2024 presidential election — and on the heels of legislative wins and better-than-expected midterm results — the same White House that cold-shouldered its high roller donors is now warming to them.
An exultant Biden sounded every bit like a president hungering for another term, imploring Americans in a speech to buy into his vision of a nation making dramatic economic strides against global competition.
Biden reminded Americans he is a “pro-union” president as he toured a technology plant in Michigan to highlight a $300 million expansion, just a day after he sided with business leaders in asking Congress to pass legislation to stave off a crippling rail strike.
Biden broke out of the crowd at a Michigan technology plant and raced back on stage to tell his audience that the US had beaten Iran 1-0 to advance to the round of 16 as the second-place team in Group B.
A Qatari official leading the country’s World Cup says that between 400 and 500 migrant workers died in connection with tournament projects, far higher than the government’s previous counts, but still well below some projections.
Multiple vehicles that were rented by the Secret Service to use during Biden’s recent visit to Nantucket caught fire Monday.
The incident took place at Nantucket Airport. Just before 5:30 a.m., staff noticed the fire consuming several vehicles in the airport’s rental car overflow area, the airport said in a release.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell criticized former President Donald Trump for meeting with white nationalist Nick Fuentes and rapper Kanye West, saying that the incident might prevent him from returning to the White House.
New York’s newly elected Republican members of Congress are refusing to criticize Trump for meeting with Fuentes.
Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the Republican leader, disavowed one of the country’s most prominent young white supremacists, but declined to criticize Trump directly for dining with the man last week at his private club in Florida.
The South Carolina Supreme Court ordered Mark Meadows, a White House chief of staff under Trump, to testify in the criminal investigation into efforts by the former president and his allies to overturn his November 2020 election loss in Georgia.
A jury found two members of the Oath Keepers militia group guilty of seditious conspiracy by plotting to forcefully disrupt the peaceful transfer of power after the 2020 election on Jan. 6, and convicted three others on lesser charges.
Stewart Rhodes was convicted of seditious conspiracy, becoming the first person to land behind bars for that crime in nearly three decades.
The split verdicts, coming after three days of deliberations, were a landmark — if not total — victory for the Justice Department, which poured enormous effort into prosecuting Rhodes and his four co-defendants.
Biden is closely watching rare protests across China but the White House has been cautious about expressing support for those speaking out against the Chinese government, which has moved quickly to stifle dissent.
Chinese health officials softened their messaging on the risks of Covid-19, urging local governments to avoid unnecessary and lengthy lockdowns, after protesters across the country denounced the strict controls.
Reacting to China’s boldest and most widespread protests in decades, the security apparatus built by Communist Party leader Xi Jinping is mobilizing on multiple fronts to quash dissent, drawing on its decades-old tool kit of repression and surveillance.
Twitter said it will no longer enforce its longstanding Covid misinformation policy, yet another sign of how Elon Musk plans to transform the social media company he bought a month ago.
The change comes as technology newsletter Platformer says Twitter employees are scrambling to restore more than 62,000 suspended accounts.
COVID reinfection is on the rise, in fact, the biggest surge in cases in New York is on Long Island.
New York State Health Commissioner Dr. Mary Bassett talked in Utica about the scary spike recently in RSV cases, but says good news might be on the horizon.
Some New York rats apparently carry COVID-19 mutations, and officials worry they could transfer the virus to humans.
Schools in New York have been slow to spend federal aid sent to them in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, an analysis released by an education advocacy organization found.
The report released by the New York Equity Coalition found school districts as of August 2022 have spent less than 10% of funding meant to boost learning after the pandemic disrupted classroom instruction.
A new report from state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli found the pandemic’s impact on the state’s labor force was more severe than the rest of the country.
Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat from Buffalo, is the first upstate candidate to win a governor’s race in roughly 100 years. We’re about to learn whether that will make a difference for the struggling region.
Advocates and state lawmakers are increasingly viewing Hochul’s pending nomination to lead the state’s top court and its sprawling court system as a consequential one as she prepares to start her four-year term in January.
Good-government organizations urged Hochul to approve a measure that’s meant to expand transparency requirements for economic development in New York.
The state Department of Health’s Maternal Mortality Board is focusing on mental health as part of its effort to reduce the number of pregnancy-related deaths in New York.
Environmental activists took a victory lap following Hochul’s decision to impose a two-year moratorium on fossil fuel-powered cryptomining, which they say consumes inordinate amounts of energy while emitting greenhouse gases. But battle’s not over.
Central New York state Assemblyman Will Barclay was re-elected the leader of the Republicans to the Democratic-dominated chamber.
The hand recount of ballots in the New York 50th Senate District race started yesterday, and the process could take up to two weeks
The state attorney general’s office announced it was filing a lawsuit against the operators of a nursing home in Orleans County where residents were allegedly drugged, subjected to inhumane conditions and, in some instances, died as a result.
As Paul Smith’s College awaits government review of its petition to merge with a Manhattan-based job training enterprise, the former chancellor of the State University of New York, Jim Malatras, has entered the process.
Mayor Eric Adams directed the police and emergency medical workers to hospitalize people they deemed too mentally ill to care for themselves, even if they posed no threat to others.
Adams said that New York City has “a moral obligation” to address “a crisis we see all around us.” He called on city agencies, such as the police department, to remove people from the streets and subways and bring them to hospitals for extended care.
Some civil rights groups are condemning the controversial plan. “It is not in the least bit a solution,” New York Civil Liberties Union Executive Director Donna Lieberman said.
City Hall is quietly opening a new mega shelter in Midtown that can hold some 600 migrants from the southern border — even as the flow of buses has slowed to a trickle, city officials said.
Adams is eyeing Washington in 2024 — but not a run for the White House. Rather he’s offering his support to the president, outgoing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her presumed successor, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, as attention turns to the 2024 elections.
Adams defended his upcoming trip to Qatar, which he says is necessary to learn more about hosting the World Cup, during an unrelated press conference, answering questions about who’s covering the expenses and his purposes for traveling.
Adams will be in Qatar tomorrow through Sunday, to observe the World Cup as New York and New Jersey prepare to host the tournament in 2026 at MetLife Stadium.
Adams said that he’d foot the bill for at least one leg of the journey.
Retired New York City government workers — who enjoy among the most generous taxpayer-provided health benefits in the U.S. — are suing Adams and the city for $55 million over $15 copays for doctors visits.
New York City’s top subway honcho is pushing back on reports of a crime wave on the rails, saying incidents are down and arrests are up since scores of extra cops flooded the system last month.
Pickpocketing is now so rampant on the subways that the NYPD Transit Bureau has formed a special team of detectives and officers dedicated solely to nailing perpetrators, officials said.
The MTA is sending armed guards into the subways to stop fare-beating — and says the move is already saving it money.
New York City has agreed to pay as much as $300 million to settle a lawsuit filed on behalf of thousands of jailed people whose releases were delayed for hours or even days after they made bail, according to court records and a lawyer.
A city Correction Department investigator testified in federal court that drugs and other contraband found on Rikers Island “usually” come in through corrupt officers and staff at the troubled jail complex.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office admitted that it pursued just two of nearly two dozen separate cases against a serial shoplifter, because it would have been “a waste of resources” to hit him with all the charges.
A student at City College was arrested for allegedly sending messages threatening to “shoot up” the Manhattan school last week, and then released without bail.
“The Phantom of the Opera” is going to continue haunting Broadway a while longer.
A federal judge ordered Amazon to stop retaliating against union organizers in a ruling which could have nationwide implications.
Ithaca, N.Y., ranked No. 8 in the nation among “Best Small College Cities” in WalletHub’s 2023 list of the Best & Worst College Towns & Cities in America.
The state Department of Transportation is continuing its recruitment efforts to find snowplow drivers as winter approaches and hundreds of job vacancies remain statewide.
Fissures are emerging between the partners working to launch a downtown Schenectady grocery store.
Organizers of the co-op have $4 million in funding commitments from the city and county governments and are working with the leaders of a longtime local business interested in buying an empty building to lease to the proposed grocery store.
New product categories will be among the changes shoppers at the Best Buy in Albany can expect this holiday season.
