Good morning, it’s Wednesday. Shanah tovah u’metukah – a good and sweet new year to all those to celebrate.
If you’re confused by this, you’re probably not aware that Rosh Hashanah – the Jewish New York – started at sundown last night and will last through sundown tomorrow. This kicks off the annual 10 Days of Awe, which will culminate in Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement and the holiest day of the Jewish year, on Oct. 12.
Again, if you’re new here and maybe your kids attend a school that don’t give the two major Jewish high holidays holidays off, Rosh Hashanah is the beginning of the Hebrew calendar year, which does not correspond with the secular calendar, and starts in the fall – not January – with the month of Tishrei.
The exact date of the Jewish New Year varies annually, but it’s usually celebrated sometime in September or October.
Unlike Yom Kippur, which is a very somber and serious holiday that involves a fast and asking for forgiveness (we’ll get there next week), Rosh Hashanah is celebratory. Observance includes attending services at synagogue, eating apples and honey (for a “sweet” new year), and blowing the Shofar (one of the oldest known wind instruments fashioned out of a ram’s horn).
Rosh Hashanah translates into “head of the year”. Though it is an upbeat holiday, it does have an element of contemplativeness, marking the start of a period of self-examination in preparation for the seeking of forgiveness for one’s transgressions.
One of my favorite Rosh Hashanah customs is the Tashlich ceremony, during which one casts bread crumbs on the surface of an outdoor water source (river, pond, ocean, stream, etc.) outdoor water source, which is supposed to be indicative of casting away the things you’ve done wrong.
This practice has grown somewhat controversial over the years, as clogging waterways with sodden bread isn’t terribly eco-friendly. It’s probably also not great for the animals – particularly birds – that don’t usually have a chance to stuff themselves on human food. I’ve seen a host of alternatives that suggest tossing small pebbles or untreated wood chips instead of bread.
You can also simply stand at the water’s edge and turn your pockets inside out without actually emptying anything into the water.
Another option that seems to be gaining favor in certain corners is “reverse Tashlich“, which involves participants removing trash from the environment. An additional idea I came across and liked was writing down your sins on small pieces of paper and shredding them.
I’m trying not to get too hung up on the negative aspects of this holiday – there’s way to much negativity in the world as it is – and focus on the things that I really enjoy: Food.
Other traditional Rosh Hashanah foods include the traditional egg bread called Challah, fashioned into a circle to symbolize the seasons and cycle of life – also, like the apples, eaten with honey – and pomegranates with their many seeds, that symbolize life’s abundance and productivity.
Before we move on to the good stuff – and by that I mean the headlines, which is why you’re here, right? – I want to just note that there’s an an annular — AKA “ring of fire” — solar eclipse on tap, which, sadly, we will not be able to see in this neck of the woods (that’s what the interwebs are for, though).
It will be fully visible from parts of the southern Pacific Ocean, Easter Island, southern Chile and Argentina, and the southern Atlantic Ocean. Partial phases will be visible in Central and southern South America, and Antarctica.
It will be slightly cooler, weather-wise, today, with temperatures “only” in the high 60s. Skies will be mostly cloudy, with a slight chance of a rain shower.
In the headlines…
Sen. JD Vance of Ohio and Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota spent most of their only debate aiming not at each other but at their running mates, re-litigating the last two administrations and eight years as each promised his ticket would deliver a new direction.
It was a substantive and mostly civil debate between two Midwestern men that laid bare the policy chasm between the two parties on immigration, abortion and foreign policy.
Vance refused to concede that his running mate, former President Donald J. Trump, had lost the 2020 election, saying: Tim, I’m focused on the future. Did Kamala Harris censor Americans from speaking their minds in the wake of the 2020 Covid situation?”
Republicans — including Trump himself — are attacking Walz for saying on the debate stage that he had “become friends with school shooters.”
“I’ve got a 17-year-old and he witnessed a shooting at a community center playing volleyball,” Walz said. “That’s awful,” Vance murmured, shaking his head.
Walz also acknowledged that he “misspoke” when he previously claimed he was in China at the time of the Tiananmen Square massacre, and admitted that he had in fact travelled to Hong Kong some months after the incident.
Walz and his wife, Gwen, headed to a pizza shop after the debate and picked out a pepperoni pie. Walz ignored shouted questions from reporters asking him to clarify several of his statements.
Several Democrats in the spin room defended Walz’s performance on the debate stage – attributing his “win” to being “nice.”
Iran fired several waves of ballistic missiles at Israel yesterday evening in a sudden assault that raised the likelihood of a direct all-out war between two of the most powerful militaries in the Middle East. Israel vowed to respond.
The attack from Iran was the culmination of a dizzying sequence of events over less than 24 hours that began with Israel launching a ground invasion into Lebanon to pursue Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed Lebanese militia.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Israelis that Iran “made a big mistake” and “will pay” for launching a missile attack on the country.
Former President Donald Trump bashed President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in the wake of an Iranian missile attack on Israel, arguing if Harris is elected in November, it would lead to mass chaos on the world stage.
Biden urged the alliance representing port employers to present a fair offer to striking longshoremen as the White House scrambled to contain the economic and political fallout of the work stoppage at U.S. ports.
Biden, in a statement, said: “It’s only fair that workers, who put themselves at risk during the pandemic to keep ports open, see a meaningful increase in their wages as well.”
Olivia Nuzzi, the star political writer for New York magazine who was placed on leave after she disclosed her personal relationship with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has accused her former fiancé of a campaign of harassment and blackmail, according to court filings.
In a complaint in D.C.’s Superior Court, Nuzzi accused the former fiancé, Ryan Lizza, a top political reporter at Politico, of hacking her devices and stealing a device to surveil her and collect materials to pressure her back into a relationship with him.
Nuzzi wrote in a court filing that in mid-August, Lizza “explicitly threatened to make public personal information about me to destroy my life, career, and reputation – a threat he has since carried out.”
In a statement, Lizza accused Nuzzi of “making false accusations against me as a way to divert attention from her own personal and professional failings; I emphatically deny these allegations and I will defend myself against them vigorously and successfully.”
Politico said Lizza was taking a leave of absence from the publication while it conducts an investigation into the matter, and that he and his employer had “mutually agreed” this was the best course of action.
Rescuers fanned out across the mountains of southern Appalachia yesterday, scouring the region for missing people and rushing supplies to communities still in dire need of food, water and power after Hurricane Helene.
A bipartisan group of senators from states affected by Helene is calling for Congress to act quickly to pass disaster relief, perhaps returning early from its recess, which is supposed to last until after the Nov. 5 election.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp said that he has suspended the gasoline tax in the state as more than 400,000 homes and businesses remain without electricity.
The New York state Division of Budget sent a letter to state agencies warning them to keep their funding requests flat ahead of the FY25-26 budget that New York lawmakers will have to pass in April of next year.
Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a bill into law that aims to expand insurance coverage of breast cancer screenings and imaging to include procedures recommended by nationally recognized clinical practice guidelines that detect the disease.
Hochul signed into law a bill intended to protect New Yorkers from the potentially addictive effects of online gambling.
Hochul is moving ahead with a plan to overhaul the administration of a home health care program serving roughly 250,000 New Yorkers, despite pushback from some lawmakers, home care companies and patient advocates.
Hochul announced that Public Partnerships LLC (PPL) will partner with New York State to deliver quality services for home care users and support caregivers through the Consumer Directed Personal Assistance Program (CDPAP).
Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s spokesman, Richard Azzopardi, counter-sued the state trooper and her lawyers who accused his ex-governor boss of sex harassment, claiming they illegally targeted him over his role.
U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer is calling on federal agencies to put more resources into tracking mosquitos and mosquito-borne illnesses as New York has seen a surge in eastern equine encephalitis (EEE) cases, including one case in a human who died.
Less than a week after pleading not guilty to charges of bribery and fraud, Eric Adams, the first sitting mayor in modern New York City history to be indicted, is scheduled to return to federal court in Manhattan today.
Adams’ legal team asked a judge to investigate nearly a year’s worth of leaks related to the New York City Democrat’s criminal case, arguing the steady drip of information has made a fair trial impossible.
The leaks have been going on for about a year, his lawyers wrote, right up to the day before the charges became public knowledge, when sources confirmed the indictment to media outlets, including Fox News.
“For nearly a year, the government has leaked grand jury material and other sensitive information to the media to aggrandize itself, further its investigation, and unfairly prejudice the defendant, Mayor Eric Adams,” the attorneys wrote in the newly filed motion.
“By the time that charges against Mayor Adams were unsealed on September 26, 2024, most of the details of the indictment and the evidence underpinning the government’s case (weak as it is) had already been widely reported in the national and local press.”
The city’s Campaign Finance Board could leave Adams on the hook for millions of dollars — or it could choose to grant him millions of dollars more.
Adams yesterday tapped Allison Stoddart as City Hall’s new chief counsel, and said he plans to nominate Muriel Goode-Trufant as the city’s next corporation counsel.
Adams, now under federal indictment, turned his weekly news conference into a solo act, with no introductory music and no aides by his side.
Adams all but embraced the Republican presidential candidate’s recent but unsubstantiated declaration that Adams is, like him, the target of a politically motivated federal justice department.
The Queens Civic Congress, an influential community organization, is calling for an investigation into Adams’ signature “City of Yes” housing proposal because of the federal indictment the mayor is facing.
The mayor of Krakow reportedly abruptly called off a sit down next week with Polish airline representatives and Adams in City Hall — after a historic federal indictment accused the mayor of accepting free luxury airline travel.
While Adams publicly offered nothing but support for his embattled adviser Tim Pearson, behind the scenes he was urging him to resign through surrogates, including former chief of staff Frank Carone, two sources maintain.
Pearson’s nephew was transferred to the NYPD Internal Affairs Bureau after less than two years on the job and promoted to detective six months ago — all while making just two arrests in his four years on the job, department records show.
A retired FDNY chief accused of fast-tracking safety inspections for thousands of dollars in off-the-books kickbacks plans to plead guilty in the case, according to new court filings.
A new accessible street entrance is coming to the Long Island Rail Road’s Grand Central Madison Concourse, at 45th Street and Madison Avenue, in the next 18 months. The project will create a new entrance for riders commuting via the LIRR and Metro-North.
Four hundred and twenty-five former New York City juvenile jail detainees are suing the city over sexual abuse they say took place at the hands of staffers. The most recent batch of 168 lawsuits was filed yesterday.
One of the students who led Columbia University’s anti-Israel encampment in the spring is suing the Ivy League school for suspending him over hateful video in which he declares, “Zionists don’t deserve to live.”
Sean “Diddy” Combs will face 120 more sexual assault lawsuits in civil court, a Texas attorney announced.
Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan is proposing a $221 million budget for next year that includes a request to the state government to create a permanent solution to the amount of state-owned, tax-exempt land in the city.
Saratoga Springs is the 17th-best small city in the country, according to the 2024 Best Small Cities in America report released by personal finance company WalletHub.
A firm hired by the Guilderland Public Library to examine the closure of the library’s in-house café found in a report that there was no evidence of racism by library staff against cafe workers.
After a campus stabbing two years ago, HVCC commissioned an outside assessment that found dozens of security threats — but declined to make those vulnerabilities public or share them with its faculty association. A judge has upheld this decision.
City residents will have two chances this week to weigh in on what possible revitalization plans will look like as part of the “Rensselaer Rising” planning project, as city officials try to nab $10 million in state funding.
Unionized postal workers are picketing in Colonie over staffing and contract issues.
Coming off a run to the National Lacrosse League Finals and set to add a top draft pick to their roster, the Albany FireWolves announced they’ll keep playing home games at MVP Arena through at least the 2026-27 season with designs on staying past that.
GE Vernova, which has significant operations in Schenectady, is laying off 900 workers in its offshore wind business unit worldwide.
The couple who founded the Salsa Latina restaurants in Albany and East Greenbush is opening a new eatery to feature food from their native Peru. Named Quechua it is taking over the former Teta Marie’s Lebanese Restaurant at 1297 Broadway, Watervliet.
John Amos, who played a stern patriarch on “Good Times,” America’s first sitcom featuring a two-parent Black family, and who had a starring role in “Roots,” the slavery narrative that became America’s most watched show in the late 1970s, has died at 84.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
