Good morning, it’s Thursday.
I don’t know about you, but when faced with a restaurant menu, I tend to pass right over the chicken options. I mean, chicken is so basic – not expensive (relatively speaking), not hard to cook, a fairly bland canvas that sort of takes on the flavor of whatever you add to it. The tofu of the animal protein world, if you will.
When I eat out, (and by this I am referring not to just grabbing a bite for daily sustenance, but an occasion meal), I want something special, something I would not be likely to try making myself. My rare forays into consuming red meat, for example, usually occur when I eat out. It’s a treat, not a staple.
Chicken is the default animal protein choice, not only across the U.S. but increasingly around the world.
Globally, chicken consumption per person has quadrupled since 1961, and it has supplanted other popular meats in a number of countries. Americans have been big chicken fans for decades now, with annual consumption rising to over 100 pounds per person in recent years – far more than either beef or pork.
Chickens are attractive for a number of reasons, not only because they offer a nutritious and lean meat compared to beef and pork, depending on the cut. They are fairly easy to raise, and grow very quickly, with one factor farm capable of producing quite literally millions of the birds every year, which enables the price point (for mass produced chicken anyway) to remain within reach for consumers.
This is not, of course, without its downsides. Factory farms have a significant negative impact on the environment – despite the big chicken industry’s attempts to cast itself as “climate-friendly.” In recent years, the fast food and grocery industries have pledged to sell “better” (read: more humanely treated) chicken. On the agriculture side, there appears to be an ongoing debate over regulations that I cannot even begin to understand.
Chickens raised without antibiotics and additives are, understandably, more expensive than the birds raised by big chicken, and organic food across the board tends to be more costly due to the increased labor and time it takes to raise them. Even so, the organic chicken market is growing and projected to keep doing so as more consumers get smart about the potential negative impact of additives, chemicals, hormones etc. in their food.
In 2023, the Department of Agriculture approved the sale of lab-grown chicken for the first time in the U.S. I have to admit that after reading more about the process, I cannot imagine myself making the switch any time soon, and despite proponents claims, the jury is still out on whether we can make advancements in the process that result in a net positive for the environment.
Today is National Poultry Day, which appears to potentially have its roots in a local festival that originated in a place called Versailles, Ohio, which I confess I did not know existed until right now.
Today will be fairly uneventful from a weather perspective, with cloudy skies and highs in the low 40s.
In the headlines…
President Trump has taken on many ancillary roles in D.C.: Kennedy Center chair. The de facto chief architect of the city’s landmark properties. And now, the nation’s chief intelligence analyst, according to Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence.
Trump threatened to wipe out an Iranian gas field if the Islamic regime continues to retaliate against Qatar over an Israeli airstrike.
Iran’s resistance to attacks by the U.S. and Israel, along with the political defiance of its new leaders, evokes a decades-old pattern of unrealized expectations for American interventions in the region.
Recent reports suggest the president may have only a thin buffer to rely on if a prolonged conflict starts to weaken growth and spur inflation.
Senate Republicans defeated a Democratic-sponsored motion to advance a war powers resolution to halt President Trump’s military strikes against Iran, a conflict that has caused oil and gas prices to soar.
U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin, Trump’s pick to replace Kristi Noem as Homeland Security secretary, stressed to his colleagues on the Senate Homeland Security Committee that he’ll be a different type of leader of the embattled department.
Mullin confirmed during a hearing on Capitol Hill that he would “absolutely” revoke a policy that has drastically slowed the flow of federal disaster aid under the current secretary, Kristi Noem.
Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul plans to vote “no” on Mullin, forcing him to secure a Democratic vote for his confirmation to move forward.
The FBI is investigating Joe Kent, the former director of the National Counterterrorism Center, who resigned earlier this week over opposition to the U.S. ongoing war with Iran, over allegedly leaking classified information.
AG Pam Bondi would not explicitly commit to appear for a closed-door deposition with the House Oversight Committee as part of its investigation into Jeffrey Epstein and its release of material about him, telling lawmakers only that she would follow the law.
Jerome H. Powell, who has faced withering pressure from President Trump just months before his term as Fed chair ends, said that he would continue to lead the central bank until his replacement was confirmed by the Senate.
An investigation by The New York Times found extensive evidence that Civil Rights icon Cesar Chavez, co-founder of the United Farm Workers, groomed and sexually abused girls who worked in the movement.
Operators of rural ambulance networks across New York are pleading with Gov. Kathy Hochul and the state Legislature for more funding to support a system they say is on the brink of collapse.
Brooklyn Democratic Sen. Julia Salazar is pushing for new rules governing body scanners in state prisons after complaints that some visitors are being wrongly denied access to see incarcerated loved ones.
The governor told reporters that the changes she wants made to the 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act are meant to prevent future rate hikes, not reduce costs hitting people today.
“The false narrative is that I’m telling people their utility rates are higher because of the CLCPA,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said. “That would be a stupid thing to say, because it’s not in effect yet.”
Hochul is begging wealthy New Yorkers who fled the city to encourage their rich pals to come back and continue padding the Empire State’s lavish public handouts.
Hochul called on the Trump administration to restore staff to the World Trade Center Health Program, joining a chorus of Republican congressmembers raising alarms that the service is faltering.
Hochul held a rally at the state Capitol in support of her executive budget proposal to change car insurance policies in an effort to lower rates.
State Sen. Jabari Brisport, one of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s closest allies in Albany, is taking aim at Hochul for not earmarking more money for child care in this year’s budget, arguing that what she has put up is comparable to “the governor wiping her own butt.”
Mamdani is creating a Mayor’s Office of Community Safety, a pared-down version of a major campaign pledge with a smaller budget than promised.
Mamdani ismordering the police department to release all body-worn camera footage within 30 days of major incidents, formalizing a practice that was not consistently met before Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch took over.
Mamdani named Gregory Anderson, who spent more than a decade at the sanitation department before going to work as Hochul’s deputy director of state operations, as the new leader of New York City’s “trash revolution.”
Anderson is returning to DSNY after spending nearly 10 years with the agency, Mamdani said in a news release.
Mamdani’s wife, Rama Duwaji, celebrated Palestinian terrorists in a flurry of resurfaced social media posts she made as a teenager and in her early 20s.
NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch defended the department’s recent shift in how it publicly reports hate crimes at a City Council hearing yesterday, saying a prior reporting method was “conflicting, wrong and confusing.”
The Trump Administration has cut tens of millions of dollars in counterterrorism funding from the NYPD, Tisch said.
An internal review of a little-known NYPD unit found that top police officials were driving around in souped-up vehicles meant to be used during undercover investigations, Tisch told the Council.
A miffed NYPD Commissioner Tisch got into a fiery exchange with progressive Bronx City Councilman Oswald Feliz over rising shootings in the borough.
Mamdani is pulling out all the stops to support Assembly Member Claire Valdez’s run for Congress.
Cyclists and e-bike riders in New York City will no longer have to appear in criminal court for minor traffic violations under a sweeping policy change announced yesterday by Mamdani.
Former Interim NYPD Commissioner Tom Donlon is taking another run at litigating the Adams administration, filing charges in state court that he was retaliated against for sounding the alarm on corruption in the upper ranks of the police department.
Dylan Lopez Contreras, a Bronx high school student arrested at an immigration courthouse nearly a year ago, foreshadowing a stark escalation of President Trump’s deportation tactics, has been released by ICE.
In a telephone interview, Lopez Contreras said that his release from detention felt like a dream. “I still can’t believe that I’m out,” he said in Spanish. “There was a moment that I never thought it would happen, but wow — it caught me by surprise.”
A correctional officer at the troubled Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn was arrested on charges that he sexually abused a detainee he was responsible for guarding, federal prosecutors said.
Luigi Mangione plans to help pick his own jury at his upcoming federal trial on on federal stalking charges in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in 2024, according to a new court filing.
After two trials lasting months each and three years since he was first arrested, Edward Holley was found not guilty of the 2003 killing his ex-girlfriend, Megan McDonald.
Siena University students are showing their school spirit with a unanimous “Go Green!” as they prepare for a significant basketball game tonight.
A $20 million restoration project is underway in Albany to revitalize the historic Selfridge and Langford building to create 49 affordable apartments and 3,900 square feet of commercial space.
A state Supreme Court justice repeatedly rejected requests to seal the records of name changes for transgender people in Saratoga County.
Saratoga Springs Mayor John Safford said Andrew Meerwarth, whom Safford chose to serve as city attorney at the beginning of his second term in January, handed in his resignation on March 6, just two months after his appointment.
The results of local village elections that took place around the Capital Region yesterday can be found here.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
