Facing Out: The Week’s Most Interesting News

June 21, 2025

For more than 200 years, Lake George Steamboat Company boats have treated visitors to extraordinary beauty. (Luke Dow)

Dear Colleagues and Friends:

Welcome to the first full day of summer. We hope you make the most of all 131,400 minutes of it.

Call us biased, call us parochial, but we firmly believe there’s a special summer charm in upstate New York. It is where the American Vacation was invented. It has long been a muse for artists and creatives, from Hudson River School painters to Gilded Age opera stars inspired by the glimmering waters of Lake George. Today, the region, diverse in terrain and scenery and cultural treasures, continues to offer a refreshing alternative to the bustle of the city: a place where you can soak in world-class culture beneath the stars or under the warmth of the summer sun, against a backdrop of rolling hills, tranquil lakes, and crisp mountain air. How about a quick tour?

WATCHING FROM AFAR: When ICE agents raided the Delta Downs Racetrack in Vinton, Louisiana, this week there was heightened interest in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., where the racing season is about to begin. ICE arrived mid-morning, blocked all access points to the Delta Downs, and began detaining individuals working behind the scenes. The raid took place during a scheduled dark day and came just days after President Trump appeared to walk back aggressive immigration enforcement targeting workplaces associated with agriculture and hospitality. The American Business Immigration Coalition, which advocates on behalf of industries reliant on immigrant labor, said nearly 78% of workers on the backstretches of U.S. racetracks are immigrants, and more than 70% are Latino or foreign-born.

PUBLIC OFFICIALS TARGETED: In Minnesota last weekend, the top Democrat in the state House of Representatives and her husband were murdered and another state legislator and his wife were shot by man who appeared at their doorsteps wearing a police uniform. Police found in the man’s vehicle a list of other targets. And here in Albany this week, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of New York, in office since only March, was confronted by a lunging, knife-wielding man outside a downtown hotel. He fled to safety in the lobby and called police. The alleged attacker, from El Salvador and in the United States illegally, is under arrest. He had been previously deported and apparently re-entered the U.S. without authorization and made his way to Albany. 

WE DIDN’T START THE FIRE: Forty-three years ago, a truck hurtled around a hairpin turn on Route 2 in Clarksburg, Mass., crashed and exploded. The driver was killed, and a wave of flaming gasoline engulfed the nearby Golden Eagle restaurant. Firefighters spent hours trying to quell the blaze with water and foam. Eventually, the Golden Eagle was rebuilt, and its owners thought the whole tragedy had been relegated to the past until Massachusetts state officials showed up. They’re concerned that the foam used to fight the fire might have contained the chemicals known as PFAS. For now, Massachusetts is allowing the restaurant to continue operating using a clean drinking water source, but the Commonwealth says the owners must clean up what remains of the PFAS by 2027.

ROCKY RUDOLPH: Roughly 43,000 years ago, a Neanderthal appears to have tried to paint a red nose on a rock that looked like a face, according to Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences.  Based on the placement of the red dot, the researchers theorize that the Neanderthal wanted to complete the resemblance. The individual may have been experiencing pareidolia, a phenomenon in which the brain perceives patterns and images—often faces—in inanimate objects. “The fact that the pebble was selected because of its appearance and then marked with ocher shows that there was a human mind capable of symbolizing, imagining, idealizing and projecting his or her thoughts on an object,” the researchers write.

The Lake George Music Festival wrapped up its 15^th season this past week with a performance of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5.  (Lake George Music Festival)

BOOMER TV: For the first time, Americans watched more television via streaming services than through cable and broadcast networks in May. Just three years ago, nearly two-thirds of all TV time was spent watching cable and broadcast, and just 26 percent was with streaming. Younger viewers were the first to jump to streaming, but another group has since made the leap as well: viewers over the age of 65. That’s why “Gunsmoke” — the fabled Western that premiered in 1955 and went off the air in 1975 — has been making regular appearances in Nielsen’s most-watched streaming series lists over the past few months.

YOU SHOULD BE DANCING: A Facing Out item published a few weeks ago declared that working from home had all but killed happy hour. Not so fast, our readers protested. Happy hours are hotter than ever, they say, and they are packed with Boomers. Right on cue comes a story from Brussels where on a recent weekend music pulsed from inside a club after midnight, red lights swept the room, and the dance floor was packed with retirement home residents.

CHOOSE CAREFULLY: When only one of 241 passengers walked away from the Air India flight that crashed in Ahmedabad last week, it reignited the old travelers’ conversation about the safest seat on an airplane. A 2017 National Transportation Safety Board study  found that those sitting in the back of the plane or near a wing, where airplanes have the most structural support, had a higher chance of staying alive than those in the front. The worst-faring seats were on the aisle in the middle-third of the cabin. But Steve Wright, a former systems and software engineer in the commercial aerospace industry, points out, “the most likely danger you will [face] on an aircraft is on the tarmac when something has gone wrong, potentially a fire,” in which case you really just want to be sitting close to an exit. 

HIGHER ED, LOWER PRICE: Colleges are so interested in recruiting certain students, they are now engaging in bidding wars. This spring, Syracuse University (where the full, non-discounted cost of attendance is $92,128 a year) admitted a young woman from Alpharetta, Georgia, but offered no merit aid. She chose Penn State instead. Syracuse got busy, first floating an offer of $20,000 per year in aid. When that did not turn her head, Syracuse came up with a further $10,000 per year discount. A few weeks later came an additional $20,000 per year in aid. “It’s almost like they’ve turned into used car salesmen,” said one dad.

LIVING THE BASEMENT DREAM: If your college graduate kids are living at home, better to resist mocking them as mooches or basement dwellers. Some prefer to be called “stay-at-home sons,” and they have gained new-found respectability in the experience of a folk hero named Brendan Liaw. Brendan is 27, holds a master’s degree in political science, and has a good command of everything from the Middle Ages to pop music. He is also unemployed and lives with his parents. And he just won $59,398 on Jeopardy.

GOOD OLD DAD: At long last, Goliath, the 135-year-old tortoise, has become a dad. Goliath weighs almost 600 pounds. He’s made his home at Zoo Miami for the last 43 years. Before that he lived at the Bronx Zoo for 52 years. On June 4, his current love interest Sweet Pea delivered a son.

THE POWER OF GRATITUDE: The first thing Alison C. Jones does each morning is to name three things she’s grateful for. The daily practice has helped her through hardships and the anxiety and vulnerability of starting her own business as a single mom.

MYSTERY DONOR: There’s a Little Free Library in Washington where last week somebody dropped off a signed memoir by Miami Dolphins legend Larry Csonka. Tucked inside was a note that suggested the book had been a gift to Secretary of State Marco Rubio of Florida. The identity of the donor is not known, and a local blog is trying to sort out the mystery.

BROTHER, CAN YOU SPARE A DIME? In a new lawsuit, former New York Gov. David Paterson is accusing his brother of cheating him out of $7 million in inheritance from their mother.

NEVER OFF THE CLOCK: Are you working longer than ever?  For many people, the workday now begins with a check of email at 6 a.m. and may not end until a final conference call at 8 p.m. On weekends, a new Microsoft study estimates that 20 percent of Americans check their emails before noon.

UNLUCKY BREAK: Two tourists visiting the Palazzo Maffei in Verona, Italy, thought the folks back home would love a photo of each of them posing in the crystal-bedazzled “Van Gogh chair.” The man slipped and fell onto the chair, and it collapsed beneath him. They fled without telling the museum staff.

CELL BLOCKHEAD: A 19-year-old man from Washington County, N.Y., broke into a closed state prison to take photos and somehow locked himself in a cell from which he called State Police who rescued him, then charged him with trespassing.

LEONARD LAUDER worked with his mother, Estee, to build a global cosmetic business and once said his goal was to make their company the General Motos of beauty. Estee Lauder today employs more than 60,000 people and sells products in more than 150 countries. He was also one of America’s most influential art patrons and philanthropists, donating hundreds of millions of dollars to museums, medical institutions and breast cancer and Alzheimer’s research. He was the source of the most significant gift in the history of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He was 92.

WILLIAM LANGEWIESCHE was one of America’s most prominent long-form non-fiction writers. For The Atlantic, Vanity Fair and The New York Times magazine, he produced pieces that unpacked major disasters and complex national security issues in authoritative, finite detail that, in lesser hands, might have bored readers, but in his managed to fascinate. For 10 years running, his pieces were finalists for the National Magazine Award, and he won it twice. Perhaps his most widely read work was “American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center,” articles and eventually a book based on his experience as the only American reporter granted full access to the World Trade Center site for nine months after 9/11. He was 70.

ANNE BURRELL was born in in Cazenovia, N.Y. but found her true love in Italy, where she attended the Italian Culinary Institute for Foreigners. When she returned to the United States in 1998, she was hired to work at Felidia Ristorante, where she met the famed chef Lidia Bastianich. Ms. Burrell spent years working in Italian restaurants in Manhattan before gaining fame on the Food Network. She began as a sous-chef to the effusive chef Mario Batali on the show “Iron Chef America,” but her shock of blonde hair and her swagger made her stand apart, prompting the network to offer her a show of her own. “Secrets of a Restaurant Chef,” premiered in 2008 and ran for nine seasons. She was 55.

“I’m a resident of the city of Albany, and … I don’t feel safe to go out for a walk and have a cigar right near the state Capitol.” 
—       U.S. Attorney John Sarcone, after being confronted by a knife-wielding man.

GET A WHIFF OF THIS: A Texas man appeared in front of a judge this week to answer a felony firearms possession charge. He lacked both a lawyer and the common sense to choose a less offensive shirt.

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Principal Authors: Mark Behan and Amanda Metzger.

Contributors: Bill Callen, Ryan Moore, Kristy Miller, Jim Murphy, Lisa Fenwick, and Luke Dow.

FACING OUT is what we do. We help companies, organizations and individuals work effectively with their most important external audiences – their customers, their shareholders, their communities, the government and the news media.  www.behancommunications.com

Facing Out features news and other nuggets that caught our eye, and that we thought might be of value to you, our friends and business associates. Some items are good news about our clients and friends, others are stories that we hope will leave you a bit more informed or entertained than you were five minutes ago. As always, we welcome your ideas and feedback. 

Let’s make it a conversation: [email protected]