Good morning. It’s Monday. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
Also, what was THAT weather situation this weekend? More 90 degrees and sunny, less 60 degrees and cloudy, windy, chilly etc. please and thanks.
I am big into outdoor pursuits of al sorts – biking, hiking, walking, running, picnicking, kayaking, even boating (in small doses). But one thing I could never really get down with (aside from golf, which is a post for a different day), is fishing.
It might be something about the need to put bait on the hook and then take the fish OFF the hook (unless you’re planning to eat them after catching, and just catching for catching’s sake makes even less sense to me).
I’m a little squeamish, I admit, about touching slimy, scale-covered things – fish, snakes, etc. – and I just find bobbing up and down while waiting for an unsuspecting sea or river-going creature to come along and think, “Hmm, a snack!” only to be cruelly deceived just isn’t my idea of a good time.
I know a lot of people enjoy it, though. And also, since I enjoy EATING fish, generally speaking, I am also aware that someone has to catch them. And doing so is big business. It’s also highly regulated and commercial fishing is under siege, in part due to the dwindling number of fish in the water (thanks again, climate change).
Regulation, of course, leads to the flouting of said regulation, which is where today’s focus – the International Day for the Fight Against Illegal Fishing – comes in.
According to the United Nations, illegal fishing is responsible for the death of 11 to 26 million tons of fish annually – about one out of every fish caught around the world – collectively worth anywhere from $10 billion to $23 billion.
This is a problem for a whole host of reasons, not the least of which is that it undercuts the livelihoods of those who are adhering to the rules, but also makes management of a rapidly depleting – and incredibly important, from a food security point of view – natural resource.
Further complicating matters, illegal fishing may also be associated with organized crime and linked to a host of other nefarious activities like human trafficking, slavery, and arms smuggling, though most often, according to at least some experts, it’s a matter of forced labor and a general violation of workers’ rights.
Illegal and unregulated fishing can lead to overfishing, which can lead to things like depletion of coral reefs and other natural habitats. It can also cause imbalances that spark harmful algae blooms.
Apparently, some who engage in illegal fishing dump their gear to avoid being caught, generating yet another problem known as “ghost gear” that entangles birds and fish and aquatic mammals.
June 6, 2016 was the first international treaty created to end illegal fishing, but that was updated last June, when members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) reached a new multilateral deal on the matter.
This new treaty has updated rules related to prohibiting subsidies to illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing, to the fishing of overfished stocks, and to fishing on the high seas outside the control of regional fisheries management organizations.
Just a reminder – pretty much any sort of fishing, be it freshwater angling or deep sea commercial – is regulated and requires some sort of permit/license. Be responsible and check with your local authorities before heading out with your rod and reel.
A not terrible day is on tap, since I started this post out with a rant about the weather, I’m feeling sort of chastened. It will be in the low-to-mid 70s, with sun in the morning and increasing clouds throughout the day.
In the headlines…
President Joe Biden on Saturday signed the debt ceiling bill, a capstone to months of negotiations that pushed the U.S. to the brink of default.
Biden signed H.R. 3746, the “Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023,” two days before today’s default deadline, on which the U.S. would run out of cash to pay its bills, according to a White House release.
Asia-Pacific markets are largely higher after Biden signed into law a debt ceiling bill that allowed the U.S. to avert defaulting on its financial obligations over the weekend.
As Biden seeks a second term, he’s again trying to frame the race as a referendum on competence and governance, pointing to the bipartisan debt limit and budget legislation he signed on Saturday as another exemplar of the success of his approach.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer emphasized that the final debt ceiling deal included far smaller cuts than House Republicans initially sought, especially ones affecting New York.
Officials investigating the cause of one of the deadliest train wrecks in India’s history were focusing on the possibility that a signal failure caused the disaster, after rescue efforts ended and all derailed cars were removed from the tracks.
An Odisha government statement revised the death toll to 275 after a top state officer put the number at over 300.
Families of the victims of India’s worst rail disaster in two decades were yesterday still struggling to reach the town where the disaster happened. The delays meant that many bodies remain unidentified and unclaimed, local officials and doctors said.
With the debt ceiling drama now behind him, Biden is starting to focus more on the mechanics of his reelection campaign.
Biden is asking voters to keep him in the White House until age 86, renewing attention to an issue that polls show troubles most Americans.
Texas GOP Rep. Ronny Jackson, a former White House physician, is continuing to raise flags over Biden’s health, concluding that he is “not fit mentally or physically” after the president fell on stage during a commencement ceremony at the U.S. Air Force Academy.
Instagram reinstated the personal account of anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who declared his bid to run in the 2024 Democratic primary earlier this year.
Republican presidential candidates and other GOP leaders shed their reluctance to criticize Donald Trump this weekend after the ex-president served up an unusual political issue: North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.
The federal grand jury that has been hearing evidence in the Justice Department’s investigation of Trump’s handling of classified documents is expected to meet again this coming week in Washington.
Attorneys for Trump reportedly turned over material in mid-March in response to a federal subpoena related to a classified US military document described by the former president on tape in 2021 but were unable to find the document itself.
GOP presidential candidate and former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley warned that a world war could break out if Ukraine pulled out of its war against Moscow and called on the U.S. and its allies to continue to supply Ukraine with the appropriate weapons.
Haley, the first Republican to announce a ’24 challenge to Trump, had an opportunity to make the case for her candidacy during a 90-minute CNN town hall in prime time, in an effort to emerge from the low single digits in polls where she has been mired.
Rishi Sunak will fly to Washington this week for talks with Biden, as the prime minister seeks to exert British “leadership” in the debate over the development and regulation of artificial intelligence.
Sunak has stressed the need to forge a “close and candid” relationship with Biden as he prepares to visit the White House after a difficult few years for US-UK relations.
Longtime “Meet the Press” host Chuck Todd announced he will be leaving the politics panel show to focus on other projects and his family, with NBC appointing Kristen Welker as his replacement.
In remarks at the conclusion of the show yesterday, Todd, 50, said he was conscious that many leaders “overstay their welcome” and that he’d rather leave “a little bit too soon than stay a tad too long.”
Todd said that he’s “proud” of what the show accomplished during his tenure, saying, “We didn’t tolerate propagandists, and this network and program never will.”
Mets owner Steve Cohen and Gov. Kathy Hochul were spotted together watching the team beat the Phillies at Citi Field – even as the hedge fund billionaire is partnering with Seminole Hard Rock on a bid for state approval to open a casino next to the ballpark.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy and Hochul are joining eight other governors in opposing censorship of school textbooks. This comes after publishers agreed to censor their educational materials.
The governors, all Democrats, signed a letter sent to publishers such as Pearson, McGraw Hill and Scholastic last month, raising concerns the companies might “be tempted to water down critical information to appeal to the lowest common denominator.”
Hochul’s pick to lead NYPA, the state’s public energy provider, is expected to receive a confirmation vote this week before lawmakers head home for the year. But some climate advocates have lobbied against Justin Driscoll since his nomination.
Disgraced ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo battled a state ethics agency in court Friday as he fights to hold onto the more than $5 million he raked in from his now-infamous book about leading New York during the pandemic.
Vincent Bradley, the chairman of the State Liquor Authority and one of the few remaining top officials appointed by Cuomo, has left the agency he headed for eight years.
It’s New York’s turn to resume Medicaid eligibility checks after a three-year hiatus. The state’s Medicaid purge will begin June 30 and continue over 14 months.
A new campaign launched by Empire State Development seeks to boost New York’s exports by encouraging businesses to enter or expand their presence in the global marketplace.
Supporters of the so-called Clean Slate Act rallied for its passage on Saturday in the waning days of the state legislative session.
With less than a week to go before state lawmakers adjourn likely for the rest of the year, Hochul yesterday said she is confident an agreement can be reached to seal many criminal records.
Creating deadly weapons without consequences pushed Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg to back new legislation introduced by Sen. Brad Hoylman that would make manufacturing guns with three-dimensional printing machines a felony in New York.
Days before Senate Democrats rejected Hector LaSalle, Hochul’s first nominee for New York’s chief judge, Hochul’s team facilitated meetings between LaSalle and top Senate Republicans in an apparent attempt to build support for his doomed nomination.
Hochul said that the state was still surveying potential housing locations for migrants upstate and on SUNY campuses, but is focused at the moment on helping Mayor Eric Adams find housing facilities in New York City, where more services are available.
Hochul has been asking the federal government, including aides to Biden, her political ally, to help with the migrant crisis. She says now that the federal debt ceiling crisis has been averted, she plans to renew her efforts.
Adams yesterday stopped by two Manhattan migrant sites — the former iconic Roosevelt Hotel and Times’ Square’s landmark Candler Tower — to meet with asylum-seekers and get quick tours.
Former Gov. David Paterson ripped Biden for failing to put a plan in place to address the migrant crisis — instead leaving New York City and other localities grappling with the surge of border crossers in the lurch.
Two asylum seekers were found dead from suspected drug overdoses outside a migrant shelter in Brooklyn early last Thursday.
So-called migrant respite centers are now housing more than 2,000 asylum seekers — and most of them have stayed at the sites for days despite promises from Mayor Adams’ office that the facilities would only be used for short-term accommodations.
Hundreds of migrants who had just moved into a converted former Manhattan prison were temporarily evacuated on Saturday after the plumbing there “exploded”, officials and witnesses said.
State lawmakers’ refusal to extend eligibility rules for a controversial property tax break could imperil projects to build 2,600 apartments for working and middle-income tenants across the housing-starved city.
“City housing officials estimate there are fewer than 10,000 units of available, non-luxury housing throughout NYC. Building more housing, quickly, is the only way forward. If they were doing their jobs, New York’s politicians would be focused on exactly that.”
Two Jewish advocacy groups have asked the IRS to probe whether CUNY Law School violated its tax-exempt status after one of its graduates delivered a widely condemned “hate speech” at commencement.
On June 27, every one of New York’s 51 City Council seats is up for grabs — in newly redrawn districts.
On a two-block stretch of Brownsville, Brooklyn in April, the police stepped aside and let residents respond to 911 calls. It was a bold experiment that some believe could redefine law enforcement in New York City.
About 10 percent of offers to New York City’s most elite public high schools went to Black and Latino students this year, education officials announced last week, in a school system where they make up more than two-thirds of the student population overall.
The MTA is nearing construction on its $100 million pilot project to outfit three subway stations with platform gates to prevent passengers from falling — or being pushed on the tracks.
A study proposed new approaches to get riders to pay to ride New York City’s transit system, including replacing subway turnstiles with fare gates that are harder to jump over.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority has signed off on a bombshell 11th-hour report claiming that Penn Station and Madison Square Garden are no longer compatible together.
The NYPD will be beefing up enforcement of sidewalk barbecues this summer, getting in the grills of scofflaws who commandeer walkways for urban cookouts.
Lithium-ion batteries from e-bikes and similar devices have fueled 92 fires, injured 64 people, and caused nine deaths so far this year – almost as many as the 10 fatalities in 2022 and 2021 combined, FDNY data show.
Five months after a blizzard devastated western New York, killing 31 residents of Buffalo, a new report cited multiple failures in the city’s response to the three-day storm that trapped many people in their cars, homes and workplaces.
The Interstate 81 viaduct in Syracuse effectively destroyed a Black neighborhood when it was built, and it has been falling apart ever since. But getting rid of it is complicated.
Antonio Brown was asked to leave the Albany hotel where his arena league football team, the Albany Empire, has been staying due to complaints of loud music and marijuana smoking, according to a source with knowledge of the episode.
More than 20,000 people lost power across Schenectady and Rotterdam early Sunday morning after a fire erupted at a local barbecue restaurant, according to National Grid.
Mexican Radio, a restaurant brand that began in a small Manhattan storefront in 1996 and grew to include a location in Hudson, closed the last of its three properties, a sprawling complex on Schenectady’s State Street that opened nine years ago this month.
A drag queen story hour originally scheduled this April at the Rockwell Falls Public Library and then postponed has now been canceled, according to an alert on the library’s website.
Cohoes Mayor Bill Keeler will co-chair the city’s Downtown Revitalization Initiative Local Planning Committee to determine how to spend the $10 million state grant to revitalize downtown and promote economic development.
Prince Harry’s bitter, yearslong feud with Britain’s tabloid press will come to a head this week. He is scheduled to take the stand in a London courtroom for a lawsuit against the Mirror newspaper group on charges it hacked his cellphone more than a decade ago.
A loud noise that was heard across much of the Washington, D.C., area yesterday afternoon was caused by the sonic boom from military jets scrambling to respond to an intrusion into restricted airspace by a private flight, military and U.S. officials confirmed.
The union that represents thousands of movie and television directors reached a tentative agreement with the Hollywood studios on a three-year contract, a deal that ensures labor peace with one major guild as the writers’ strike enters its sixth week.
