Good Monday morning. Up and at ’em!
A number of noteworthy things occurred over the weekend.
Saturday was May 4th (AKA ‘May the 4th Be With You), which President Joe Biden commemorated with an assist from Luke Skywalker (for those not in the know, that’s actor Mark Hamill). Hamill was at the White House on May 3 and gave the commander-in-chief a new nickname: Joe-bi-Wan Kenobi.
Saturday was also the 150th running of the Kentucky Derby, which resulted in a nail biting photo finish – the closest three-horse photo finish since 1947. Ultimately, the winner was a horse named Mystik Dan, who finished at 16-1 odds. A horse named Sierra Leone took second place.
And then yesterday was Cinco de Mayo, which, officially speaking, commemorates the anniversary of the 1862 victory by Mexican troops over invading French forces at the Battle of Puebla. Unofficially speaking, it’s an excuse to eat tacos, chips, salsa and guac and drink prodigious numbers of margaritas.
Sundown yesterday marked the beginning of Holocaust Remembrance Day, (AKA Yom HaShoah, which lasts through sundown this evening and is held to honor the victims murdered by the Nazis – including 6 million Jews – and educate the populous about the atrocities committed in the concentration camps during WW II.
The day is also intended to raise awareness in order to prevent future genocides – something that takes on a heightened and particularly fraught meaning at the moment in which we find ourselves. The White House issued a proclamation that underscores the delicate dance in which the president is engaged as pro-Palestinian protests roil college campuses across the nation.
And, last but not least, yesterday was Orthodox Easter, (AKA Pascha), which usually falls about four to five weeks after the Easter observed by Christians who follow the Gregorian calendar.
So, there was A LOT going on over the past two days, and you could be forgiven for needing a break from your weekend. There’s no rest for the weary, though, because we have something to commemorate today, too, or rather, a number of someones who have dedicated their lives to helping others. It’s National Nurses Day!
You may have heard abut the nursing shortage the U.S. is experiencing just as demand for care is rising, thanks to the aging Baby Boomer generation. Though the nursing workforce is projected to grow, not enough nurses are entering the profession to keep pace with the number of positions available.
As with other medical professions, the pandemic took its toll on nurses, many of whom just burned out and decided to either retire early or switch careers entirely. This trend is particularly troublesome when you consider the declining number of young nurses in the field, and nursing homes have been hit especially hard.
In New York, for example, there are a lot of registered nurses, but only 53 percent of those who are actively licensed are working, according to the State Nurses Association. New York’s nursing shortage isn’t nearly as bad as what other states are projected to experience in the coming years. Still, state officials are concerned enough to launch an incentive program to help those interested in entering nursing and other health care professions (other than doctors) afford the considerable cost of their education.
Nurses have, over time, assumed a greater share of responsibilities and taken on new roles as the healthcare landscape continues to shift and change with the advent of new technologies, therapies, and treatments. Research shows that access to quality nursing improves patient outcomes and expands access to care.
I’m sorry to say that things are looking a little dicey on the weather front. Today will be a little meh, with cloudy skies and morning showers that end in the afternoon. Temperatures will top out in the mid-70s.
Tomorrow is looking fantastic…more on that, well, tomorrow, and things sort of go downhill from there. This being upstate, though, one never knows. Fingers crossed the forecast will change – especially as Mother’s Day approaches.
In the headlines…
A driver died after crashing into a security barrier near the White House on Saturday night around 10:30, prompting an investigation by the Washington police department, the Secret Service said in a statement.
The city’s police department said it was investigating the crash “only as a traffic crash,” but the Secret Service said it would conduct a separate investigation into the driver’s background. President Joe Biden was in Wilmington, Del. at the time.
“There is no threat or public safety implications,” Anthony Guglielmi, a Secret Service spokesman, wrote on social media, adding that the crash posed no threat to the White House.
Japan and India on Saturday decried remarks by Biden describing them as “xenophobic” countries that do not welcome immigrants, which the president said during a campaign fundraising event earlier in the week.
The Japanese Embassy on Friday issued a slight rebuke of Biden for referring to Japan as “xenophobic,” saying it raised concerns with administration officials over the remarks.
The Israeli military said it was asking tens of thousands of Gazans sheltering in eastern Rafah to temporarily evacuate to what it described as a humanitarian zone, a sign that Israel was inching closer to invading the city in defiance of international pressure.
The latest round of Gaza cease-fire talks ended in Cairo after “in-depth and serious discussions,” the Hamas militant group said Sunday, reiterating key demands that Israel again rejected.
After earlier signs of progress, the outlook appeared to dim as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to resist international pressure to halt the war.
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant claimed Hamas wasn’t serious about a deal and warned of “a powerful operation in the very near future in Rafah and other places across all of Gaza.”
Netanyahu said his cabinet voted to shutter the Israeli operations of Al Jazeera, the Qatari-based network that is a major source of news in the Arab world and has highlighted civilian suffering in Gaza during the war with Hamas.
After a strongest indication from a UN agency that there is famine in Gaza, the Israeli agency overseeing the Palestinian territories insisted it had “increased its humanitarian effort to flood the Gaza Strip with food, medical equipment and equipment for tents.”
Gov. Kristi Noem of South Dakota, already under fire for killing her family’s 14-month-old dog and boasting about it, yesterday took aim at another family’s pet: Commander, Biden’s bite-prone German shepherd.
Experts said that there were some circumstances in which dogs are so aggressive that they should be euthanized. But euthanasia should be an option of last resort.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said “chaos” and “dysfunction” in the House GOP has “effectively” given Democrats the majority, lending credence to far-right criticism of Speaker Mike Johnson as the GOP majority slims.
Former President Donald Trump leads Biden by 2 points in a new ABC News/Ipsos poll, 46% to 44%, as the 2024 race for the White House presses on.
Trump compared Biden’s administration to the secret police force of Nazi Germany in remarks at a private, closed-door donor retreat on Saturday afternoon.
Senior congressional Democrat James Clyburn responded to Trump’s remarks, calling them “incredible but it’s not surprising”, and adding that the former president “is given to hyperbole on every subject that he ever approaches.”
Trump has vowed to deliver the “largest mass deportation effort” in American history if he gets back into office next year, targeting millions of illegal migrants across the country.
At Washington dinner parties, dark jokes abound about where to go into exile if the former president reclaims the White House.
Everyone mentioned as a potential Republican vice presidential contender is a winner right now as far as Trump is concerned, according to an audio recording obtained by Axios.
North Country Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik sidestepped a question from Fox News’s Maria Bartiromo about whether Trump had discussed her being a potential running mate for him, noting that there are “a lot of names” being considered.
In a trial that turns on a hush money payment to a porn star, Trump loyalist Hope Hicks offered emotional testimony Friday that portrayed him as a family man.
The dramatic appearance of Hicks, once one of Trump’s closest aides, riveted the audience. During her testimony, she blinked back tears.
California Democrat Rep. Ro Khanna said that Biden “should and will” visit college campuses amid the ongoing pro-Palestinian protests that have roiled the country.
The Los Angeles Police Department removed a pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of Southern California early yesterday morning, pushing several dozen people out of the campus gates in the latest crackdown on student protesters there.
The University of California, Los Angeles, said that it had created a new campus safety position as the school moves to reopen this week and examines what led to clashes between demonstrators.
Pro-Palestinian protesters dismantled their encampment at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie on Saturday after reaching an agreement with the institution that requires administrators to review a divestment proposal.
Dozens of students walked out of Indiana University’s graduation ceremony on Saturday in protest of the war in Gaza, moving instead to a green space on campus where students had been demonstrating for weeks.
Columbia University’s president, Nemat Shafik, released a video message late on Friday, following several weeks of tension over Gaza war protests on campus that have spawned a wave of antiwar activism at universities across the country.
City officials have blamed “external actors” for escalating demonstrations at Columbia University and elsewhere, but student protesters reject the claim.
Overall, NYPD records show, more than two-thirds of the demonstrators arrested on or near Columbia’s campus this week had some connection to the university.
New York taxpayers have shelled out at least $2.7 million in political pork over the past decade — including $430,000-plus since last July — to five nonprofits that helped organize or support radical anti-Israel student protests.
The NYPD sergeant who accidentally fired his gun during an operation to oust anti-Israel protesters from Columbia mistakenly let the slug fly as he shifted the weapon from one hand to another so he could unlock an office door, officials said.
City College has a unique place in New York, with a mandate to educate the poorest residents, and a long history of radical politics and protest. To many in the campus community, welcoming a police presence onto the Harlem campus was unthinkable.
Columbia University is rethinking its commencement plans after weeks of pro-Palestinian protests, according to a source at the university and two members of student government.
The student editors at the Columbia Law Review want administrators to cancel the law school’s exams and pass all its students, claiming in a letter that the police action on campus left the student body “irrevocably shaken”.
Mayor Eric Adams defiantly told New York City colleges yesterday that they should move forward with their graduation ceremonies and not cave to anti-Israel provocateurs looking to disrupt the proceedings.
“It’s a wonderful experience to graduate from an institution, and I don’t think we should allow anything to get in the way of our normal way of life,” Adams said on ABC’s “This Week.”
Adams wanted to send New York police in earlier to break up the pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses, but “we were not going to overstep out authority,” he said.
Gov. Kathy Hochul seems to have made a calculation that Taylor Swift can help connect her with younger voters who have seemed skeptical, said Hank Sheinkopf, a Democratic political consultant.
Hochul announced Friday that a 13-acre site at Republic Airport in East Farmingdale, Long Island, has been earmarked for a major redevelopment that will include affordable housing, open space and “other community amenities.”
State Sen. Kevin Parker claims the law allowing a rape lawsuit against him to move forward was unconstitutional — even though he actually voted for the legislation and then bragged about it.
Legislation that would prohibit social media companies from collecting children’s personal data and prohibit them using addictive feeds to keep young users online has gained bipartisan support among state lawmakers and is expected to pass this session.
The state Legislature plans to spend its 18 remaining legislative days debating hundreds of proposals, including bills to protect kids from addiction to social media and to limit the cost of measures to combat climate change.
East Harlem Assemblyman Eddie Gibbs, believed to be the first formerly incarcerated person to serve in public office in New York, has used his experience to help people reinvent themselves, including a high-flying 1990s rapper who went to prison for murder.
A bill proposed by state lawmakers seeks to prevent skyrocketing rental costs for 25,000 co-op apartment dwellers in buildings with ground leases, including some in Manhattan’s wealthiest neighborhoods. Most co-ops own the building and the land underneath it.
A gap in policing scalper bots comes as many of those operators have continued using technology to help them circumvent measures designed to thwart their ability to purchase tickets in large numbers.
While renewable energy projects have faltered, including two offshore wind projects off the coast of Long Island being scrapped in mid-April, nuclear energy in New York has continued steadily for a number of years.
Adams plans to implement what critics claim is a “hidden tax” that would make homeowners’ water bills soar 8.5% – despite boasting his new budget plan won’t include more taxes.
City leaders and parks advocates say greenways, playgrounds and other outdoor spaces will soon be plagued with overflowing trash, dirty bathrooms and overgrown landscapes thanks to Adams’ proposed budget cuts.
City Hall’s chief counsel on Friday demanded Council Speaker Adrienne Adams open an ethics investigation into a member for conduct the mayor’s team deemed “harassing and inexcusable” during a hearing this week.
The City Council is weighing a bill that would require the Department of Sanitation install and regularly fill dog waste bag dispensers on or next to all public litter baskets on city streets.
The Police Benevolent Association is suing Adams and Commissioner Edward Caban for the NYPD’s “zero tolerance” policy on uniformed officers who violate new protocols for anabolic steroid, human growth hormone and nutritional supplement use.
All 3,000 city Department of Correction body-worn cameras were reportedly yanked Saturday — a day after an officer at the Rikers Island correctional facility was injured when hers ignited.
The department said one officer needed treatment for burns and smoke inhalation after her body camera caught on fire without warning, while attached to her chest on Friday.
Frustrated civic leaders in central Queens are opposing any proposed licensed cannabis shops in their neighborhoods until authorities padlock all the illegal ones.
A landmark Queens deli sold 2,217 chicken-cutlet sandwiches to help the family of slain NYPD cop Jonathan Diller — raising more than $15,000 in the process.
More than 380,000 additional city public-school students had their personal data hacked in a massive cyber attack — bringing the total number of kids affected to well over 1 million.
Three New York City synagogues and The Brooklyn Museum received false bomb threats on Saturday, according to police.
Threats of explosives were emailed to two synagogues in Manhattan Saturday, according to the NYPD. One on the Upper West Side was evacuated “out of an abundance of caution” and another in Midtown was unoccupied, according to police.
Experts say glass eels, which have long been endangered, are making a “bumpy comeback” in the Hudson after decades of population decline.
Bishop DeDe Duncan-Probe of the Episcopal Diocese of Central New York is the only woman among the five candidates seeking election as the next presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, and she is the only one in the group to be nominated by petition.
The restaurant 15 Church in Saratoga, a favorite among the thoroughbred set, was forced to cancel its Kentucky Derby party because a renewal of its liquor license, expected for months from the state Liquor Authority, has yet to be approved.
A judge rejected motions filed by New York City and Albany officials seeking dismissal of a lawsuit filed by the town of Colonie alleging the cities had unlawfully converted a Wolf Road hotel into a migrant homeless shelter without following state regulations.
Police are investigating after dozens of headstones were found knocked over in a cluster of Jewish cemeteries off Schermerhorn Street in Rotterdam.
A name, image and likeness (NIL) collective is planning to launch soon to support the University at Albany men’s basketball program.
Former International Paper executive and Paul Smith’s College alumni John Dillon died in March 2023. A year later, a park tied to his legacy and named after him is in jeopardy of not opening for the 2024 season.
Mystik Dan won the 150th running of the Kentucky Derby on Saturday afternoon at Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky. The winning time was 2:03.34.
He won in a photo finish over Sierra Leone and Forever Young. The Churchill Downs crowd roared as the three horses made their way down the stretch and then fell silent as no one could tell who won the race by a nose.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
