Good morning, it’s Wednesday. We’re in for a veritable heat wave today, with temperatures rising into the mid-30s. A few flurries or snow showers might develop, but nothing significant in the way of accumulation.
Things are looking up! It’s funny what a difference a few degrees can make. Yesterday, it was only in the low 20s and yet I started sweating in my heavy winter coat when I took the dog for his late afternoon walk.
Science tells us that it can take the body up to two weeks to fully acclimate to extreme cold – a process you can hurry along by lowering the temperature inside your home, removing some of your layers, and/or spending more time outside in the winter.
The study linked above had a mix of male and female authors, which might make it stronger and more impactful. Evidence shows that diverse teams – including those with a significant presence – produce research that is both more original and more innovative. This sort of stands to reason: Adding a diversity of viewpoints, experience, and perspectives is bound to result in more effective and creative solutions.
If that’s the case, why is there still such a significant gender imbalance in STEM (which, in case you needed a refresher, stands for “Science, Technology, Engineering and Math”)?
Though women made up just over a quarter (26 percent) of STEM employees in this country in 2022 – up a measly one percent since 2000 – there were 12 female-led STEM companies on the Fortune 500 list in 2024, which was a 50 percent increase from the eight that made the cut in 2015.
There continues to be a significant pay gap between men and women employees in STEM fields – a median annual salary of $66,813 per yearner women – around 4% less than the typical man ($69,841) – according to one report. And that gap may be going in the wrong direction, widening instead of closing, according to a 2024 study.
Millions of dollars have been spent trying to boost women’s enrollment in STEM-degree programs, which has worked to some extent. But the rate at which women actually obtain those degrees has remained persistently low – especially when it comes to engineering programs, though there’s some growth in more research dominated fields.
STEM employers know that have a gender diversity problem, and they are recruiting women heavily. Part of the problem is that girls continue to be underrepresented in key high science, math and tech high school classes that ideally serve as the gateway for continued education in said fields. Early interest in STEM among girls tends to drop off precipitously as they move through their K-12 career.
One of the best ways to continue trying to tackle this seemingly intractable problem is to talk about it, which is the purpose of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science. Because, says the UN: “As societies grapple with widening inequalities, the integration of artificial intelligence (AI), social science, Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and finance emerges as a four-pillar approach to accelerate inclusive and sustainable development.”
Today is the 11th anniversary of the first observance of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, and though there are areas of progress, we clearly have a long, LONG way to go until we reach true gender equity in this space.
Since we dispensed with the weather up top, let’s get down to business.
In the headlines…
Canada was reeling a day after a shooter killed nine people and injured 25 others in a remote town in northeastern British Columbia, the third-deadliest shooting in the country’s history that comes amid a wider debate about gun control.
Seven people were found dead in Tumbler Ridge Secondary School, including a person believed to be the shooter, who died from what appeared to be a self-inflicted injury, according to Superintendent Ken Floyd of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Police know the identity of the alleged shooter, but did not give further details and declined to say if they were a child.
The fatal shootings came as Canada’s federal government faces hurdles in a national gun buyback program that has proved politically unpopular and a logistical quagmire.
Federal prosecutors in Washington sought and failed to secure an indictment against six Democratic lawmakers who posted a video reminding active-duty members of the military and intelligence community that they were obligated to refuse illegal orders.
It was remarkable the U.S. attorney’s office in DC — led by Trump ally Jeanine Pirro — authorized prosecutors to go into a grand jury and ask for an indictment of the six members of Congress, all of whom had served in the military or the nation’s spy agencies.
The Department of Homeland Security has hired a social media manager from the Department of Labor for a key communications job, despite posts he made on DOL media accounts that raised internal alarms over possible white-nationalist messaging.
Trump ruled out pushing another one-party reconciliation package through Capitol Hill. “In theory we’ve gotten everything passed that we need,” he said. “Now we just need to manage it. But we’ve gotten everything passed that we need for four years.”
President Trump is expected to meet Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel at the White House today, as the Middle East remained on edge over recent threats of an American attack against Iran.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick admitted that he visited late sex predator Jeffrey Epstein’s private island — after FBI files debunked his claim that he broke off contact in 2005.
Hundreds of pages of documents in the Epstein files reveal how the disgraced financier used his connections to try to facilitate entry into colleges and pay the tuition for many of the young women in his orbit, including those who say he sexually abused them.
Attorney General Pam Bondi is expected to face bipartisan skepticism today on Capitol Hill over her handling, and perceived bungling, of the release of the investigative files related to Epstein.
The National Governors Association said it will no longer hold a formal meeting with Trump when governors are scheduled to convene in Washington later this month, after the White House planned to invite only Republican governors.
A person was detained for questioning yesterday in the kidnapping of Nancy Guthrie, hours after the FBI released surveillance videos of a masked person wearing a handgun holster outside Guthrie’s front door the night she vanished from her Arizona home.
The person was picked up south of Tucson by the Pima County Sheriff’s Department, assisted by the FBI, and authorities were preparing to search a location linked to the individual, a law enforcement source said.
The Arizona DoorDash driver who was detained by law enforcement last night in the search for Guthrie’s kidnapper has been released after several hours in custody.
It was not clear if it was the same person captured on surveillance video recovered from “back-end systems” that the FBI had released yesterday afternoon. In that video, the masked figure had a handgun holster and was caught outside Guthrie’s front door.
Lt. Gov. Antonio Delgado announced he’s ending his long shot campaign for governor after concluding there is “no viable path forward.”
“(T)hough my campaign has come to an end, I fully intend to do all I can in our effort to build a more humane, affordable, and equitable state that serves all New Yorkers,” Delgado wrote in a statement posted on X yesterday.
Delgado’s exit from the New York governor’s race left few surprised, despite the fact that he said at Friday’s Democratic state convention that he intended to petition to get on the ballot.
Gov. Kathy Hochul’s re-election campaign said in a statement that the party was now “united” in its push to stop Republicans from raising costs and unleashing “masked ICE agents into our streets to terrorize innocent communities.”
Republicans searching for a path out of the political wilderness in New York will place their hopes in Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman today, choosing a suburban county executive allied with Trump as their nominee for governor.
Blakeman’s running mate, Madison County Sheriff Todd Hood, made the case that he’s ready for a statewide political run after a career in law enforcement.
John Samuelsen, president of the International Transport Workers Union representing 60,000 subway, rail, bus and airline workers in New York, said that his union will not back Hochul’s re-election bid amid disputes over labor issues.
New York has joined the World Health Organization’s Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network following Trump’s decision to withdraw the U.S. from the UN’s global health agency, per a Tuesday announcement from Hochul.
Hochul accused Trump of throwing a “temper tantrum” over his administration’s continued freeze on Gateway Tunnel construction funding, which led to the halting of all work on the vital rail project.
More than a dozen governors, including Hochul, joined boycott of a National Governors Association dinner at the White House. The dinner has now been cancelled.
State Republicans nominated a former prosecutor, Saritha Komatireddy, to run against Attorney General Letitia James yesterday, avoiding a primary when a second candidate dropped of the race at the 11th hour.
Feb. 14 is a special day in New York. Not because of Valentine’s Day. It’s the annual deadline to change or update party affiliation for the June primaries.
In their first appearance together since Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s tempered endorsement of Hochul, the two presented a united front on what’s shaping up as a contentious budget issue: permitting reform.
Hochul insisted that the state has been more than generous with the city — ahead of Mamdani’s trip to Albany to push the Big Apple’s budget asks.
The rookie New York City mayor will travel to Albany today – the Waterloo for predecessors seeking state approval for wish list items like a West Side football stadium or long-term control of the Big Apple’s public school system.
The so-called “Tin Cup Day” sojourn is his first as mayor, and he’s expected to face skeptical lawmakers who’ll grill him on New York City’s reported budget gaps and the mayor’s wish to raise taxes on the wealthiest people and corporations.
The death count amid recent frigid conditions jumped with city officials acknowledging seven additional deaths, the news coming after the Mamdani administration came under fire for its response to the freezing weather at a Council oversight hearing.
The seven new deaths all occurred at private residences, coming on top of the 18 New Yorkers found dead outside since the city’s brutal streak of Code Blue nights began.
The question of when a New Yorker can be moved indoors against their will was front and center during a City Council hearing yesterday on the deaths of 18 people during the recent brutally cold weather.
A heartbreaking 96% of pleas to help homeless New Yorkers never actually led to any assistance since the deadly cold snap hit the Big Apple — with city workers unable to even find the destitute denizens most of the time.
The Mamdani administration is reportedly pushing for a free bus pilot program to be conducted over five weeks this summer as New York hosts this year’s FIFA World Cup.
Mamdani named three new commissioners to head the Department for the Aging, the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities and the Office of Technology and Innovation.
Mamdani needs to find as much as $700 million more a year to hire all the teachers it will take to comply with a state law requiring classrooms across New York City to have 25 students or less by 2028.
Mamdani, girding for a potential local surge in immigration enforcement, has created an interagency group to plan for and quickly respond to such “crises.”
Mamdani is rescinding a new rule set in motion by his predecessor that would have made it harder for people to get off the streets and into shelters.
Mamdani’s Chancellor Kamar Samuels spent yesterday defending mayoral control of New York City’s public schools‚ a system the mayor campaigned against but now largely supports. Some Mamdani political allies remain against the policy as it currently exists.
US House Speaker Mike Johnson slammed Mamdani’s health department staffers for politicizing the agency by forming a “global oppression working group” that accused Israel of committing genocide.
“Instead of trying to force a radical-left foreign policy agenda, the bureaucrats in Zohran Mamdani’s Department of Health should focus on delivering the services New Yorkers pay for with their tax dollars,” Johnson (R-La.) said in a statement on X.
The group formerly known as Hot Girls 4 Zohran is rebranding as Hot Girls Organize, focused on five new guiding principles, like “Hot Girls Melt ICE,” as well as fights against climate change, AI, landlords and AIPAC — a far broader focus from its original mission.
A majority of New Yorkers asked in a recent poll said they oppose the driverless robot cars over concerns about lost jobs for drivers, as well as the taxis’ ability to drive in bad weather on the city’s chaotic streets.
NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch is sending 200 more cops into the Bronx and splitting it into two patrol commands as the northernmost borough continues to buck the citywide dip in crime.
Some local officials are pledging to restore the Stonewall National Monument’s large Pride flag after a Trump administration directive this week removed it from the only national park site dedicated to LGBTQ+ history.
The removal of the flag from the Manhattan monument, the symbolic heart of the gay rights movement, came after a Trump administration memo about flags at national park sites.
A New York City police officer was charged with assault and other crimes after separate Brooklyn episodes in which, prosecutors said, he slapped a handcuffed prisoner and threatened a man who complained about his driving.
A man was fatally shot on a Bronx subway platform yesterday afternoon after a fight that started on the train, police said.
Rodent experts said the prolonged cold weather could kill some New York City rats and cause others to have fewer babies, resulting in a smaller population in the spring.
Former acting U.S. Attorney John A. Sarcone III adjusted his formal title to “first assistant U.S. attorney” as he awaits a ruling on his office’s request for a stay of a judge’s decision finding he was unlawfully appointed to his position by U.S. Attorney Pamela Bondi.
A Colonie man has been sentenced to more than seven years in prison after he orchestrated a plan to hire someone to kill his romantic rival and have his body fed to pigs at a Pennsylvania farm.
For the second day in a row, residents and businesses around the City of Albany faced power outages.
The Atlanta businessman who died last week after he skied into trees at Whiteface Mountain died of blunt-force trauma to the chest, State Police said.
University at Albany will automatically admit Albany High School students who have an average grade of 90 and have taken Algebra II, school officials announced.
Community members are concerned about the 31.92-acre major subdivision proposal near Spring Avenue and Creek Road, which has been under review with the Brunswick Planning Board for nearly two years.
A family of asylum-seekers who were taken in by the clergy and parishioners at Newtonville United Methodist Church has been reunited in their native Colombia after the father was detained at a routine December immigration check-in.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
