Progressive Charlestown
a fresh, sharp look at news, life and politics in Charlestown, Rhode Island
Sunday, September 13, 2026
The greenest building is the one still standing after a disaster
Build green for lower costs and survival
Fernanda Cruz Rios, Drexel University
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| Construction choices are often the difference between a house surviving a hurricane or being torn apart. Mark Wallheiser/Getty Images |
When Hurricane Michael tore through the Florida Panhandle in 2018, a beach house called the Sand Palace was left standing, while more than half the buildings around it were destroyed.
Its owners had built it to withstand roughly double the wind speed that Florida’s code required, with reinforced concrete walls on 40-foot (12-meter) pilings. The cost was about 15% to 20% more than standard construction, but the owners wanted a house that could survive storms.
Designers usually measure how “green” a building is by its carbon footprint – the greenhouse gases released making, transporting and running everything that goes into it. The Sand Palace’s extra concrete expanded its carbon footprint, making the house appear less environmentally friendly on paper.
But a green building has to last for its intentionally small carbon footprint to make a positive difference. Damage from a flood, a wildfire or a hurricane can require significantly more building materials to repair it, ballooning its carbon footprint over time.
As storms happen more often and with more intensity, considering the full life cycle of a building and its costs over time becomes increasingly important to get an accurate picture of how sustainable that building really is.
As we age, the body appears to sacrifice walking efficiency in exchange for stability.
Scientists reveal why walking gets so much harder with age
Flinders University
New Australian research is shedding light on why walking often becomes slower and more tiring with age. The findings suggest that the body gradually gives up some movement efficiency in favor of staying stable and upright.
Led by researchers at Flinders University and the University
of Canberra, the study found that aging is associated with a
"safety-first" walking strategy. This approach emphasizes stability
instead of speed and energy efficiency, helping explain why older adults may
fatigue more quickly and also face a greater risk of falling.
Researchers analyzed movement data from 107 healthy adults
between the ages of 26 and 86. They found small but meaningful age-related
differences in how the ankle and nearby muscles manage each step.
How the Ankle Changes With Age
Lead author and sport and exercise technology expert Dr.
Cody Lindsay says the ankle is essential for maintaining balance while also
helping propel the body forward.
The 75 Most Corrupt Things Trump Did in 2026
So far.
A long read but worth it
Sep 04, 2026
This is a list of the 75 most corrupt things Trump did in 2026. These are not all of the corrupt things. There were many more, all of which I chronicled throughout the year in my daily column ‘Today in Politics.’ I was planning to list 100. However, to get it under the length restrictions for Substack emails, I had to cut the list down to 75.
… These examples are limited to instances where Trump used
the presidency to enrich himself, family members and/or wrangle or extort
donations to his PAC. It also doesn’t include corruption from his cabinet
members or other members of his administration when those things didn’t
directly benefit Trump or his family - and there were many of those.
… These are listed in chronological order for the dates when
the stories broke which uncovered the corruption. The sheer scope and breadth
of these scams and grifts is staggering. It is hard to imagine one family
coming up with this many ways to profit off the presidency, but the Trumps have
certainly been tireless in finding creative new paths to turn the US presidency
into their own personal ATM.
… The other thing that is noteworthy, especially heading into the midterms, is that Republican majorities in Congress have allowed this to happen with zero oversight or investigations. They stood passively by doing nothing, which has only emboldened Trump to be more brazen in his schemes knowing there will be no consequences. Democrats already plan several investigations of many of these specific things as soon as they are able to acquire subpoena power and control of hearings.
… If you aren’t a subscriber or haven’t been in the past, you can read yesterday’s daily Today in Politics column here. My weekly podcast Uncovered is here. Now, on to the specific examples of the most corrupt presidential administration in the history of the US. By far.
Bottom of Form
Saturday, September 12, 2026
League of Rhode Island Businesses crashed and burned in Charlestown and across the state
Conservative business group’s multi-PAC strategy flops as General Assembly incumbents prevail
By Nancy Lavin, Rhode Island Current
In contrast to the stunning primary day upsets in which Democratic challengers dethroned Rhode Island’s governor and the mayors of Providence and Pawtucket, every sitting state lawmaker seeking reelection won Wednesday night.
Incumbents typically hold an advantage, especially in Rhode Island, where the rigor of the job coupled with low pay and a dominant Democratic party suppresses competition. Nearly two-thirds of the 113 General Assembly seats featured a single candidate this election cycle, with just 13 sitting lawmakers — all Democrats — facing primary challengers (excluding open seat contests).
“It’s very hard to go against General Assembly leadership,” said John Marion, executive director of Common Cause Rhode Island. “They put a lot of resources into protecting their members.”
But a new political group with an unconventional campaign finance strategy to unseat progressive lawmakers focused more attention on the few contested races by endorsing conservative-minded candidates. The League of RI Businesses champions gun rights, lower taxes and business-friendly policies, and backed a slate of challengers by circumventing the state law capping political action committee donations at $2,000 per candidate per year.
Yet The League’s 40 PAC strategy — one for every city and town plus a statewide organization — and open solicitation of anonymous donations failed to notch any wins on primary night.
All seven of the Democratic challengers endorsed by The League in state legislative races lost, some defeated by a 50- or 60-point margin.
“Not only did we not win, we just got clobbered,” said Dave Levesque, co-founder of The League. “It’s an embarrassment.”
EDITOR'S NOTE: Despite their monumental losses in the Primary, LORIB is still running a number of candidates in the November 3 General election. Among their targets: Charlestown's Sen. Victoria Gu, local Reps. Megan Cotter, Carol McEntee, Kathy Fogarty and (oddly) Sam Azzinaro. I say oddly because Sam is at least as conservative as Rep. Leonidas Raptakis who was endorsed by LORIB. Plus, Sam is male and nearly all of LORIB's targets are progressive Democratic women.
LORIB tried and failed to find challengers to local Democrats Sens. Sue Sosnowski and Bridget Valverde and Rep. Teresa Tanzi. They will all retain their General Assembly seats since they face no opposition on November 3.
LORIB is also endorsing MAGA nut Sen. Elaine Morgan who, in her own way, represents the northern half of Charlestown. She faces a powerful challenger in Samantha "Sam" Wilcox, Richmond Town Council President - Will Collette
Republican challenger to US Rep. Seth Magaziner must be accountable for his role in the January 6 insurrection
| Harry Dunn, Seth Magaziner, and Daniel Hodges |
Here’s the video: Magaziner v Mellor - YouTube
Representative Magaziner condemned the January 6 United
States Capitol attack and Donald Trump’s pardons for the
rioters, which included those found guilty of assaulting law enforcement
officers.
“Five years ago, a violent mob attacked our nation’s Capitol
and the police officers sworn to protect it,” said Representative Magaziner.
“They did this because they wanted to overturn a presidential election. Their
candidate, Donald Trump, lost that election, so they tried to stop the count
through violence and rob the American people of their voice.
Mellor's campaign in a nutshell (photo by Tom Ferrio)
“The rioters punched and trampled police officers, beat them
with sticks and rocks, sprayed them with mace, and electrocuted them with
tasers. Over 170 officers suffered injuries, including broken bones and
concussions. Four officers died by suicide in the months that followed.
Hundreds of Capitol and DC Metropolitan Police officers bravely did their duty
that day and put their lives in harm’s way to protect the building and our
democracy. We must not forget the sacrifices that those officers made, or let anyone
rewrite the history of what happened on January 6, 2021.”
A once-nightly pill could offer a new way to treat obstructive sleep apnea without a CPAP machine.
Goodbye CPAP? New sleep apnea pill cuts breathing events by 44%
American Thoracic Society
A once-nightly oral medication significantly improved obstructive sleep apnea in a large phase 3 clinical trial presented at the 2026 ATS International Conference. The drug, known as AD109, is designed to treat OSA by targeting the neuromuscular problems that contribute to airway collapse during sleep.
The study, "Aroxybutynin and Atomoxetine (AD109) for
Obstructive Sleep Apnea: A Randomized Phase 3 Trial," was published in
the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.
In the SynAIRgy trial, people who received AD109 experienced
fewer interruptions in breathing, less oxygen deprivation, and better overall
blood oxygen levels while they slept. More than 40 percent improved enough to
move into a less severe OSA category, while 18 percent achieved complete
disease control.
‘Starwashing’: The new space race has an environmental problem
Kate Yoder, Senior Staff Writer
"This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist's weekly newsletter here."
As artificial intelligence devours more land and electricity, a new breed of tech companies promises that outer space holds the solutions to our problems on Earth. If data centers are so hard to find a place for down here, why not put them hundreds of miles above the planet instead? Since power demand surges in the evening, why not send tens of thousands of mirrors into orbit to shine sunlight down on demand, powering solar farms after sunset?
These ideas might sound far-fetched, but they are real proposals from Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and start-ups in the space industry. As private industry drives the new “space race,” now launching more rockets than countries do, even the cosmos is starting to feel a bit crowded. A growing amount of so-called “space junk” has led to concerns that all the metal could collide, creating a destructive layer of debris that anything launching into orbit would have to contend with. Earlier this month, part of a discarded SpaceX rocket unintentionally slammed into the moon at 5,400 miles per hour, blasting a new crater.
As Musk’s SpaceX, Bezos’ Blue Origin, and other companies expand into space, they risk causing more problems for Earth in the process: air pollution, climate effects, and light pollution. The practice of downplaying these negative consequences while trumpeting the message that space operations can make life better on Earth has a new name: “starwashing,” a term the space researcher Melissa E. Yingling helped popularize in an article published in The Conversation earlier this month.
Friday, September 11, 2026
The Trump EPA Is a Toothless Friend of Polluting Industries, Analysis Shows
Lasting damage to public health
By Peter Aldhous
This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.
By its own account, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is doing a fantastic job. In a March report on its performance in the last fiscal year, the agency boasted that it had concluded 2,127 civil enforcement cases, “the highest in nine years.”
That number wasn’t wrong, but it was very misleading, an Inside Climate News analysis of EPA data reveals.
For starters, the 2025 fiscal year included the last three-and-a-half months of Joe Biden’s presidency. Comparing years beginning on Jan. 20 casts the current EPA’s record in a much less forgiving light. New lawsuits filed against the most egregious polluters—one of the strongest weapons in the EPA’s enforcement arsenal—have fallen off a cliff under the second Trump administration.
Meanwhile, the EPA has shifted how it approaches the administrative orders that comprise the vast bulk of its enforcement. It’s imposing fewer monetary penalties in favor of orders that merely require offenders to clean up their act.
Those compliance orders are now dominated by small-scale actions against public water systems, slapping officials on the wrist for failing to file inventories of and inform customers about water service lines made of lead.
While it’s important to address potential contamination of drinking water with a potent neurotoxin, these orders represent an administrative checkpoint in a much longer process of pipe replacement mandated by the Biden administration. They are a far cry from tough action against violators in the oil and gas industry and other major polluters and have allowed Donald Trump’s EPA to pad its numbers with activities that impose little cost on offenders.
No more science. Instead, we need "conservative-based" research
For a clear and intelligent rebuttal, read Why “Conservative Research” Is Confirmation Bias Disguised as Science
Why your brain keeps making the same decisions – even when better options exist
Have you wondered why some people voted for Trump three times?
Technische Universität Dresden
Why do we keep making the same choices even when better options are available?A recent study from TUD Dresden University of Technology
suggests that what people have done before can shape their current decisions
more strongly than researchers previously believed. The findings offer new
insight into how people make everyday choices and develop habits. The results
were published in the journal Communications Psychology.
Brown University research finds additional benefits to getting vaccinated for shingles
Shingles vaccine linked to 24% lower dementia risk
Brown University
Older adults who received the Shingrix shingles vaccine were 24% less likely to be diagnosed with dementia over four years in a study of more than 500,000 people.The analysis drew on Medicare data and health records from
more than 500,000 adults age 66 and older who were admitted to skilled nursing
facilities for either short-term or long-term care. Researchers compared
patients who received at least one dose of the recombinant shingles vaccine,
known as RZV or Shingrix, with patients who remained unvaccinated. Shingrix was
introduced in 2017 and is currently the only shingles vaccine available on the
market.
















