Facing Out: The Week’s Most Interesting News

August 2, 2025

Go jump in the lake, kids. It’s good for you and the problems of the world will wait.

Dear Colleagues and Friends:

In the span of a few days, one of the strongest earthquakes in history struck eastern Russia and set off tsunami waves in the United States and Japan. A gunman killed four people in a midtown Manhattan office building. Russia continued to bombard Kyiv. Gaza starved, and 60,000 people are dead. And closer to home in Upstate Warren County, N.Y., a driver, apparently angry about being delayed in a construction zone, got out of his truck and punched a public works employee in the head.

But on the shores of Lake George, N.Y., there was the sound of joy. Kids yelped as they leapt into the sky, then splashed down in the water, replaying a happy scene many generations old, making new friends and long-lasting memories. It was a magical reminder of how the timeless peace of a beautiful lake is a vital refuge from the world.

BOLTON GEM: Speaking of Lake George, one of Bolton Landing, N.Y., greatest gems is the Bolton Historical Museum. This summer it’s celebrating Lake George’s rise to national prominence in the 1950s and 1960s as a premiere family vacation destination, when a “summer-long resort for the wealthy few (became) a place where everyone could come by car for a two-week vacation.” Among the features is the exhibition is "Distinctive Fashion for Gracious Living,” a collection of evening gowns and dresses donated by the late Bolton philanthropist Patricia Bixby Hoopes, all of which exemplify the buoyant spirit of the era. Mrs. Hoopes died last June. The exhibit was organized by the museum’s vice-president, Lisa H. Hall, publisher of the Lake George Mirror.

FINDING THE WRIGHT HOME: In the woods of Westchester County, 30 miles north of Manhattan, sits a home, a natural refuge actually, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. The famous architect wanted to connect middle-class Americans with nature. He believed that the buildings we live in shape the people we become. Roland Reisley has lived in the home for 73 of his 101 years. It was built with local materials, a flat roof, a carport, wood paneling, built-in shelving, concrete floors and custom-made furniture. The house is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. "Neuroscientists tell us that awareness of beauty in one's environment for a long time reduces stress, can have physiological benefits, perhaps even longevity," he explained. "And I realized that there's not a day of my life that I didn't see something beautiful.”

MANY HAPPY RETURNS: Costco is famous both for its low prices on quality products and its “risk-free 100% satisfaction guarantee” return policy. Costco gives customers who pay annual membership fees of $65 to $130 an unlimited grace period to return most purchases for a full refund. Now, Costco shoppers are speaking out online about abuse of the policy: Like toilets returned sloshing with dirty water, Christmas trees returned after Christmas, and the woman in Seattle who returned a couch after two and a half years and still got a full refund. Employees speaking to USA Today say the policy does what it was intended to do: It breeds loyalty, drives sales and entices new members. And there are, actually, limits. A Connecticut employee cited one shopper who routinely returned lighting fixtures purchased nearly a decade ago as she remodeled her home, lightbulbs and all. “That is pretty common,” the employee said. “People will remodel their homes and they will literally pull up their flooring and return it.” She was eventually turned away. When the return policy is “really abused,” Costco revokes memberships, the employee said. But for most shoppers, she said, “we’ll take anything.”

Photo: Gordon Ellmers

TO SOAR ONCE MORE: North American bald eagles were virtually gone from New York State for 15 years, their population reduced to a single unproductive pair by the early 1960s. That’s when a New York State DEC Commissioner and a young Cornell graduate student stepped in to save America’s bird. Journalist Anthony Hall recounts one of the greatest conservation success stories of our time for the August issue of Quest Magazine. There was “nothing inevitable” about the return of this majestic species to the Empire State. After 50 years of hard work, the state is now home to hundreds of pairs of breeding bald eagles.

THE YANKS ARE COMING: In London, it’s a buyers’ market for single-family homes. While new tax policies have seemed to deter some wealthy international buyers, Americans are undeterred. Americans now form the largest demographic of overseas buyers in London, accounting for 25% of home purchases last year, up from 18% in 2023, according to Beauchamp Estates, a luxury real-estate agent. U.S. buyers historically tended to rent for up to five years before putting down roots, but now they are opting to buy after only a year. Maybe they are opting for London instead of Cape Cod, where the median sales price for a single-family home in Barnstable County now sits at $802,500.  While Provincetown led the county year to date with a median price of $1.94 million for a single-family home, even the so-called “affordable” towns like Bourne and Yarmouth posted median prices in June of $640,000. 

KINGS TO QUEENS: New York City is building a passenger rail line that, at long last, would connect its two most populous boroughs, Brooklyn and Queens, without going through Manhattan. The 14-mile line will be called the Interborough Express. It's expected to make 19 stops along what is now an active freight line — "through lush greenery, dark tunnels and gritty industrial areas — to connect neglected swaths of the city with few transit options. The fare would cost the same as a subway ride, and the entire trip would take less than 40 minutes," The New York Times says. Construction is expected to be completed by early next decade and could trigger a building boom in some of the city’s few remaining underdeveloped areas.

QUEENS GIRL: As students prepare to return to campus in this politically polarized time, the Adirondack Theater Festival in Glens Falls is home to the Northeastern debut of a one-woman play about college life in the 1960s. Specifically, life at expensive, left-leaning Bennington College. “Jackie” (Deidre Staples) travels from Nigeria to discover college, Vermont and herself, encountering the cultural upheaval that characterized campus life. Caleen Sinnette Jennings wrote Queens Girl: Black in the Green Mountains. The play is directed by Danielle Drakes. It runs at the Charles R. Wood Theater through Aug. 6.

POLITICAL PRAYERS: For the first time, the Internal Revenue Service has declared that churches and other non-profit groups can endorse political candidates. The agency reinterpreted a longtime ban, known as the Johnson Amendment, that will give religious and non-profit leaders the most significant victory they’ve seen in political organizing in 70 years. The Johnson Amendment dates to 1954, when it was inserted into a tax bill by Lyndon B. Johnson, then a senator, bypassing any debate on the matter. The future president, known for his mastery of all forms of political power-wrangling, was reacting to efforts by nonprofits that were supporting his rival in a primary.

SUIT YOURSELF, KIDDO: Parenting that’s light on discipline has dominated the culture in recent decades. But critics blame the approach for some of Gen Z ’s problems in adulthood. Now, some parents are taking a different tack. Won’t bring your raincoat? Walk home in the downpour. Didn’t feel like having lasagna for dinner? Survive until breakfast. Left your toy on the floor again? Go find it in the trash under the lasagna you didn’t eat. 

JIMMY WHO? Not even the comedians mention him anymore. It’s been 50 years and we still don’t know what happened to Jimmy Hoffa.

THE NEW YORK CHOICE: New York City recorded its deadliest shooting in 25 years this week, only seven months after the daytime murder of the CEO of UnitedHealthcare in front of a Manhattan hotel. All of which puts the focus on crime in the runup to a mayoral election that presents dramatic contrasts.

HOW SWEET THE SPA: Saratoga Springs, N.Y., is home to three of the best dessert shops in America, according to USA Today readers: Darling Doughnuts, the Saratoga Chocolate Co. and Sweet Mimi’s Cafe and Bakery. Meanwhile, New York Upstate names three Capital Region drive-ins among the best in the state: the venerable Jumping Jacks in Scotia, Jack’s Drive-In in Wynantskill, and Farmer’s Daughter in Saratoga Springs.

STILL A GETAWAY FOR THE FAMOUS: Media reports this week said Lake George played host to rapper Ice Spice and the New York Jets’ Sauce Gardner, who just signed a $120.4 million deal with the Jets and became the highest-paid cornerback in National Football League history.

SHOWER THE PEOPLE: This is getting a little personal, but when do you shower — in the morning or at night? Nighttime showers may lead to better rest, better hygiene, and even greater creativity, health experts say.  Morning showers get your motor started. But then there’s the knotty question of your hair.

SHORTER DAYS: The length of a day is the time it takes for Earth to complete one full rotation on its axis —24 hours or 86,400 seconds on average. But in reality, each rotation is slightly irregular, and a full rotation usually takes slightly less or slightly more than 86,400 seconds. In the long run, these variations can affect computers, satellites and telecommunications.

TOM LEHRER AND MORT MINTZ: Lehrer, who was 97, spent 30 years teaching math at the University of California, Santa Cruz, with stints at Harvard and MIT. But he is fondly remembered for writing and performing naughty — some would say subversive — songs that mocked everything about good behavior.  Mintz, who died at 103, was one of the great investigative journalists of his era. He is remembered for his work revealing the dangers of the morning sickness drug thalidomide, the risks of the Dalkon Shield, and uncovering GM’s campaign to intimidate Ralph Nader. 

JAMES BERYL MASS was all about sleep. When he was earning his bachelor’s degree from Williams College and a master’s and Ph.D. at Cornell, he thought sleep was useless. But he began thinking more deeply about it around 1:30 a.m. one morning in 1969, when he observed a sleep research subject hooked up to a polygraph machine. “Seeing firsthand the complexity of the sleeper’s journey through the night …I changed my opinion of sleep and began to ponder the same questions posed by dedicated sleep researchers.” He came to conclude: “If we don’t get adequate sleep, our quality of life, if not life itself, is jeopardized.” The father of the power nap was 86.

“He would always be reading in our basement, typically the Bible, and he would be drinking a 40-ounce malt liquor — typically, Olde English.”
— John Pelzer speaking of his dad Dan, a social worker at a juvenile correctional facility in Ohio, who read at least 3,599 books in his life and kept a careful list.

Some of the linked material in Facing Out requires a subscription to read.

Principal Author: Mark Behan.

Contributors: Amanda Metzger, Ryan Moore, Bill Callen, John Brodt, Kristy Miller, Ambassador Dan McManamon, Troy Burns and Tony Hall.

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. 

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