Questions raised about long-term melatonin use

Think melatonin is safe? New research reveals a hidden heart risk

American Heart Association 

Remember that statistical correlation is
not the same as causation

Key Research Findings

• A large review of health data from more than 130,000 adults with insomnia found that people who took melatonin for a year or longer were more likely to develop heart failure, be hospitalized for the condition, or die from any cause compared to those who didn't take the supplement.
• While the study cannot prove that melatonin directly causes these outcomes, the strong association raises important safety questions about long-term use of this popular sleep aid. Researchers emphasize that more studies are needed to fully understand melatonin's impact on heart health and ensure it can be used safely.

People who regularly take melatonin to improve sleep may face serious health risks. A preliminary study presented at the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions 2025 found that adults with chronic insomnia who used melatonin for a year or longer were more likely to develop heart failure, be hospitalized for heart failure, and die from any cause than those who did not take the supplement. The findings will be discussed at the AHA's annual meeting, taking place Nov. 7-10 in New Orleans, a leading international event for cardiovascular science and clinical research updates.

Melatonin is a hormone produced by the pineal gland that regulates the body's sleep-wake cycle. Its levels naturally rise in the dark and drop during daylight hours. Synthetic melatonin, which is chemically identical to the natural hormone, is widely used to treat insomnia (difficulty falling and/or staying asleep) and jet lag. In many countries, including the U.S., melatonin supplements can be purchased over the counter. However, because they are not regulated in the U.S., products can differ widely in purity and dosage.

‘Mega-Layoffs’ Under Trump as Corporations Have Cut 1 Million Jobs This Year—Most Since 2003

“Trump put billionaires in charge of everything” 

Brad Reed

The US labor market, which in recent months had ground nearly to a halt, now appears to be entering a downward spiral.

As reported by the Washington Post on Thursday, new data from corporate outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas found that employers in October announced 153,000 job cuts, which marked the highest number of layoffs in that month since October 2003.

Total announced job cuts in 2025 have now reached 1.1 million, a number that the Post describes as a “recession-like” level comparable to the steep job cuts announced in the wake of the dotcom bust of the early 2000s, the global financial crisis of 2008, and the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.

John Challenger, the CEO of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, told the Post that the huge number of October layoffs showed the economy was entering “new territory.”

“We haven’t seen mega-layoffs of the size that are being discussed now—48,000 from UPS, potentially 30,000 from Amazon—since 2020 and before that, since the recession of 2009,” he explained. “When you see companies making cuts of this size, it does signal a real shift in direction.”

CNBC noted that the Challenger report found that the tech sector is currently being hardest hit by the layoffs, and it said that the adoption of artificial intelligence was a significant driver of job cuts.

Van Slyke’s “commitment” to apple pie and motherhood is not enough to make up for fiscal mismanagement.

Van Slyke must answer for CCA’s glaring financial blunders that she helped to create

By Will Collette

Loving animals and nature is not this election's key issue,
but money management is

The Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA) retread candidate Bonnita B. Van Slyke in the December 2 town council special election just issued a piece in the CCA blog that reprises her promises to support a broad array of environmental issues, the same ones she covered at length in her big, fancy mailer.

Her two opponents, Democrat Jill Fonnemann and Republican Laura Rom, also believe in protecting our environment – clean water, healthy ponds and streams, dark skies, and all our critters and birds. Jill is especially strong on animal protection. The candidates differ on how to achieve our goals, but don’t differ on the goals themselves.

So let’s stipulate that all the candidates love our town and its beautiful environs. And dogs.

The real difference between Van Slyke and her rivals comes into sharp relief when you look at her record on how to manage the taxpayers’ money. Van Slyke makes two “promises” that are belied by her actions and omissions.

Van Slyke pledges “to provide open, honest, responsible leadership” and commits to “manage our town’s administration and budgets effectively” which she failed to do during her previous time on the Town Council.

Bonnie B. left the Town Council in 2022 at the height of Charlestown’s worst financial scandal in a generation, a crisis where she was one of the key architects and led the cover-up and misinformation campaign.

And in her own writings for this special election, she still is.

In 2022, Charlestown learned that under the total control of the Charlestown Citizens Alliance, Charlestown had not only achieved the dubious distinction of having the highest administrative costs in the state but that this CCA-controlled administration had “lost” (they say “misallocated”) $3 million for two years. The “$3 million oopsie.”

Van Slyke was the CCA’s principal spokesperson leading the cover-up and disinformation campaign to deny there was a problem and, failing that, blame someone else while refusing reasonable requests for an outside, impartial review.

Van Slyke pushed – and still pushes – pumping up the town’s surplus (“Unassigned fund balance”) beyond any reasonable need. The $3 million oopsie grew out of the accumulated pockets of cash the CCA had squirreled away in the town budget often used to finance Planning Commissar Ruth Platner’s shady land deals.

Van Slyke praised and defended ex-Town Administrator Mark Stankiewicz even though he failed at his #1 job which was to take care of the money. Instead, he presided over ending legal public access to records about the town’s finances and shady land deals and allowed the $3 million to get lost. Then Stanky and ex-Budget Commission Chair Dick Sartor did their own self-audit and of course found themselves blameless.

Van Slyke consistently obstructed every effort by then minority Council member Deb Carney to bring in an outside forensic auditor to find out what really happened and to fix it.

And did I mention that according to the RI Public Expenditure Council, Charlestown’s administrative costs peaked as the worst in the state per capita during the final year of CCA's reign? We're right there at the very bottom of the chart. Here's what RIPEC found (and note that the CCA NEVER even acknowledged this data, never mind acted on it):

Voters threw out the CCA in 2022, electing four of five Charlestown Residents United (CRU) candidates, leaving the CCA with only Susan Cooper to wave their flag. Cooper dropped out in 2024 and voters replaced her with another CRU candidate, giving CRU a 5-0 supermajority.

Stonewall Stanky, Charlestown's cover-up king

After the 2022 election, one of the first orders of business was what to do with erstwhile Town Administrator Mark Stankiewicz, executor of the CCA’s clamp down on public records and failed money manager. Right up until Stanky’s exit, Van Slyke praised his feckless performance as masterful and condemned the CRU for driving out this superhero.

The facts showed that Stanky’s only talent was his loyalty to the CCA, but even that turned out to be phony. It turns out Stanky had already lined up a new job in Berkley, MA even before the 2022 election which the CCA was expected to win.

While clueless Van Slyke and the CCA were campaigning to save his job in 2023, Stanky was already out the door and was simply trying to get the biggest severance package he could. Incidentally, Stanky only lasted six weeks at the Berkley job before moving on to mess up Pawtucket’s finances.

Then in 2025, Van Slyke and the CCA repeated the process when the CRU decided not to confirm CCA-aligned Budget Commission chair Dick Sartor – a central figure in the CCA fiscal meltdown – to another term on the Commission. Sartor failed at his job to provide oversight over Charlestown’s finances and teamed with Stankiewicz to run the cover-up of the $3 million oopsie.

The CRU wanted him out but naturally, Van Slyke wanted him retained. Ever the champion of incompetence.

Since the CCA was booted out of office, the CRU-led Town Council has done a great job of cleaning up the mess the CCA left. And to see exactly what the CRU did, see what the state's chief auditor found. 

According to the Rhode Island Auditor General, in their first year in office, the CRU-led Council improved Charlestown’s financial management in the following ways:

Raised more revenue. 

Under the CCA, revenue was $28 million. Under the CRU, this increased to $30 million.

Lowered expenses. 

RIPEC flagged Charlestown’s highest in the state expenses which were $31.2 million, more than the revenue collected. Under the CRU, expenses dropped to $29.8 million.

Increased the town’s savings. 

This is the unassigned fund balance (UFB) that the CCA criticized the CRU for failing to increase. In fact, according to the Auditor General, the CRU raised the UFB by 17% from the CCA’s $5.3 million to $6.2 million.

Improved pension funding. 

Funding to cover future pension costs rose from the CCA’s $8.3 million level to $8.8 million under the CRU.

Reduced Charlestown’s debt by a LOT. 

Under the CCA, Charlestown’s debt was $7.9 million. Under the CRU, debt dropped to $6 million, almost 25% less.

Erased the deficit the CCA left behind. 

According to the Auditor General, the CCA left behind a DEFICIT of $3,266,029. The CRU erased that deficit and ended FY23 with a SURPLUS of $157,666.

This table on page 16 of the Auditor General’s report gives the detail:

Not once has the CCA acknowledged these hard facts, sticking instead to Bonnita Van Slyke's false narrative that the CCA was infallible. Oh, she also loves her dog.

Election started today (November 12)

Early, in-person voting has started at Town Hall. If you plan to vote by mail, ask our Town Clerk Amy Weinreich for a mail ballot application. If you've already applied, your ballot should be on the way.

Generally, special elections like this draw almost exclusively from those who pay attention to politics. Turn out is usually very low, maybe a thousand if we're lucky. A three-way race like this is especially hard to predict. 

The CCA will spend from its huge treasury built on non-resident cash to send you fancy mailers telling you Charlestown needs to go back to the good old days when they ran things. The financial facts shown above tell a very different story. 

Democrat Jill Fonnemann is pledged to support the CRU’s sound financial management for a better, more prosperous Charlestown. Let's move FORWARD, not backwards. 

Film premier in South Kingstown

 

Click HERE for YouTube trailer.

TICKETS TO DEMOCRACY NOIR

November 15 Food Drive in Richmond

Speaker Shekarchi appoints Rep. McEntee as chairwoman of House Judiciary Committee

McEntee replaces Bob Craven after Craven’s aborted AG campaign

Rep. Carol Hagan McEntee (D-Dist. 33, South Kingstown, Narragansett) has been appointed by Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi as the new chairwoman of the House Judiciary Committee. She has served as the committee’s first vice-chair for the last several legislative sessions.

“It is a tremendous honor to be appointed as the new Judiciary chair, and I thank Speaker Shekarchi and my House colleagues for having faith in me to lead this important committee. At a time when countless rights are being trampled upon and disregarded, the House Judiciary Committee stands as a crucial line of defense for all Rhode Islanders and that will not change. I look forward to working with other members of the committee and the entire House of Representatives to ensure that the people of Rhode Island are cared for, supported and protected,” said Chairwoman McEntee (D-Dist. 33, South Kingstown, Narragansett).

EDITOR'S NOTE: South Kingstown representative Carol Hagen McEntee replaces long-time Charlestown assistant solicitor Bob Craven after Bob's four-day long disastrous campaign for Attorney General revealed issues about his past legal problems that made his candidacy untenable. In addition to ending his campaign, Bob also resigned as Judiciary Committee chair, the position McEntee is filling, and declared he is not seeking re-election.  - Will Collette

The Quiet Collapse of America’s Reproductive Health Safety Net

Next comes a big uptick in unplanned pregnancies, miscarriages and sexually transmitted diseases as Trump and Bobby Jr. de-fund reproductive health

Céline Gounder 

In late October, Maine Family Planning announced three rural clinics in northern Maine would close by month’s end. These primary care and reproductive health clinics served about 800 patients, many uninsured or on Medicaid.

“People don’t realize how much these clinics hold together the local health system until they’re gone,” said George Hill, the group’s president and CEO. “For thousands of patients, that was their doctor, their lab, and their lifeline.”

Maine Family Planning’s closures are among the first visible signs of what health leaders call the biggest setback to reproductive care in half a century. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Population Affairs, which administers the Title X family planning program, has been effectively shut down. 

At the same time, Medicaid cuts, the potential lapse of Affordable Care Act subsidies, as well as cuts across programs in the Health Resources and Services Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are eroding the broader safety net.

“When you cut OPA, HRSA, and Medicaid together, you’re removing every backup we have,” said Clare Coleman, president of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association. “It’s like taking EMTs off the road while closing the emergency rooms.”

Asked about the cutbacks, HHS press secretary Emily G. Hilliard said, “HHS will continue to carry out all of OPA’s statutory functions.”

Supreme Court blocks transgender people from updating passports

The relentless attack on transgender people

This story was originally reported by Kate Sosin of The 19th. Meet Kate and read more of their reporting on gender, politics and policy.

Emily Scherer for The 19th

The Supreme Court will allow the Trump administration to bar transgender people from changing the gender markers on their passports, it announced in an order Thursday. The order is the latest in a back-and-forth on the policy as the country debates the right for its transgender citizens to live openly.

LGBTQ+ advocates quickly called the order dangerous and discriminatory. 

“This decision will cause immediate, widespread and irreparable harm to all those who are being denied accurate identity documents,” said Jessie Rossman, legal director of the ACLU of Massachusetts. “The Trump administration's policy is an unlawful attempt to dehumanize, humiliate and endanger transgender, nonbinary and intersex Americans, and we will continue to seek its ultimate reversal in the courts.”

Transgender people have been able to change the gender markers on their passports since 1992. Gender markers delineating nonbinary people as “X” became available in 2021. The Trump administration sought in January to block gender changes in passport updates, declaring that the federal government would recognize only “male” and “female” and saying these could not be changed after birth. 

Trump's Golden Ballroom turns into giant bribery factory

Trump no longer seems to try to hide his corruption

Jake Johnson for Common Dreams

IDIOTS! Donald Trump NEVER pays contractors

The US Justice Department has reportedly given the tech behemoth Alphabet a green light to acquire the cybersecurity firm Wiz after it was revealed that the Google parent company donated to President Donald Trump’s $300 million ballroom project.

The merger deal is valued at over $30 billion and would mark Alphabet’s largest acquisition to date, even as the company faces antitrust cases at the state and federal level. Wiz CEO Assaf Rappaport announced the Justice Department’s decision on Wednesday at an event hosted by the Wall Street Journal.

The DOJ approval came after Bloomberg reported in June that the Justice Department’s antitrust arm was reviewing whether Alphabet’s acquisition of Wiz would illegally undermine competition. The following month, the Justice Department ousted two of its top antitrust officials amid internal conflict over shady corporate settlement deals.

Lee Hepner, an antitrust attorney and senior legal counsel for the American Economic Liberties Project, called the DOJ’s clearing of Alphabet’s Wiz acquisition “the kind of blunt corruption that most won’t notice.”

Hepner observed that news of the approval came shortly after the White House released a list of individuals and corporations that have pumped money into Trump’s gaudy ballroom project. Google—which also donated to Trump’s inauguration—was one of the prominent names on the list, alongside Amazon, Apple, and other major corporations.

Google is reportedly funneling $22 million to the ballroom project.

“These giant corporations aren’t funding the Trump ballroom debacle out of a sense of civic pride,” Robert Weissman, co-president of the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen, said earlier this week. “They have massive interests before the federal government and they undoubtedly hope to curry favor with, and receive favorable treatment from, the Trump administration.”

“Millions to fund Trump’s architectural whims are nothing compared to the billions at stake in procurement, regulatory, and enforcement decisions,” he added.

According to a Public Citizen report published Monday, two-thirds of the 24 known corporate donors to Trump’s ballroom project—including Google—are beneficiaries of recent government contracts.

The war continues

Trump claims credit for Veterans Choice Act

Nov. 13: Microplastics in Narragansett Bay: Hotspots, pathways, and solutions

The rising price of plastic pollution

By Meredith Haas

Victoria Fulfer (Michael Salerno)

Microplastics have become a defining pollutant of our time, now detected from polar ice cores to human bloodstreams. These fragments, fibers, and beads—smaller than five millimeters and often invisible to the naked eye—form as everyday plastics break down from bags, bottles, textiles, and tires.

Lightweight, durable, and nearly indestructible, they persist for decades, accumulating in rivers, estuaries, and the ocean. Recent studies estimate that humans ingest tens of thousands of microplastic particles each year, while coastal ecosystems face mounting risks to food webs, water quality, and sediment health. Until recently, scientists lacked a clear understanding of how these pollutants travel through estuaries like Narragansett Bay, or where they tend to accumulate. University of Rhode Island researchers have found that the top two inches of the floor of Narragansett Bay contain more than 1,000 tons of microplastics.

URI researchers Sarah Davis, Ph.D. ’24 (postdoctoral research fellow) and Victoria Fulfer, Ph.D. ’24 (5 Gyres Institute) will share ongoing microplastics research and results from recent studies examining how and where microplastics accumulate in the waters and sediments of Narragansett Bay—and what that means for future studies on the impacts to coastal ecosystems.

Their presentations will be featured during Rhode Island Sea Grant’s Coastal State Discussion, held Thursday, Nov. 13, from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. (ET).

Assessing wild turkeys in Rhode Island

Trying to better understand these majestic birds

Kristen Curry

Photo by Will Collette

New URI project launching this fall will study the state’s wild turkeys to better understand and maintain local population

Everyone’s talking turkey at this time of year. But Scott McWilliams’ lab at the University of Rhode Island is thinking about them in particular, hoping to call significant attention to the iconic New England bird.

The University’s Department of Natural Resources Science is launching a five-year study of the North American Eastern Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo silvestris) to track its health and population in Rhode Island, in partnership with the state’s Department of Environmental Management (DEM).

Professor McWilliams, a certified wildlife biologist, says the team seeks to learn more about the reintroduced bird’s health in terms of disease prevalence, stressors, reproduction, and other habits.

“This is a well-known species, but we don’t know a lot about the drivers of this population,” he says.

Foreign Food Safety Inspections Hit Historic Low After Trump Cuts

Despite Trump tariffs, we still buy lots of imported food, especially what we cannot grow ourselves

By Annie Waldman and Brandon Roberts for ProPublica

American inspections of foreign food facilities — which produce everything from crawfish to cookies for the U.S. market — have plummeted to historic lows this year, a ProPublica analysis of federal data shows, even as inspections reveal alarming conditions at some manufacturers. 

About two dozen current and former Food and Drug Administration officials blame the pullback on deep staffing cuts under the Trump administration. The stark reduction marks a dramatic shift in oversight at a time when the United States has never been more dependent on foreign food, which accounts for the vast majority of the nation’s seafood and more than half its fresh fruit.

The stakes are high: Foreign products have been increasingly linked to outbreaks of foodborne illness. In recent years, FDA investigators have uncovered disturbing lapses in facilities producing food bound for American supermarkets. In Indonesia, cookie factory workers hauled dough in soiled buckets. In China, seafood processors slid crawfish along cracked, stained conveyor belts. Investigators have reported crawling insects, dripping pipes and fake testing data purporting to show food products were pathogen free.

When Americans hurt by the rising cost of living believed Donald Trump, they made a big mistake

Welcome Back Inflation! Soon You’ll Be Bigger Than Ever!

Mitchell Zimmerman

In 2024 Donald Trump promised: “a vote for Trump means your groceries will be cheaper.” “Prices will come down,” he vowed, “and they’ll come down fast, with everything.” “When I win,” he pledged, “I will immediately bring prices down, starting on Day One.”

Trump never said how he would accomplish this wonder because in fact he had no idea. And didn’t care.

Surprise! Surprise! Prices did not come down “fast,” “immediately,” “starting on Day One” or at all. They’re moving in the other direction.

In the nine months since Trump took office, here’s what’s happened to prices:

• Electricity + 7%
• Natural gas + 6%
• Gasoline + 6%
• Beef (ground chuck) + 13%
• Oranges + 15%
• Bananas + 9%

In fairness, chicken prices are the same, eggs are down and bread is 2% cheaper. If all you eat are egg salad sandwiches, you’ll do fine under Trump. (But hold the mayo – the mayonnaise producer price index is up 4% over the year).

Trump’s Labor Department admits his immigration policies have caused “acute labor shortages” posing “immediate dangers to the American food supply” — and “higher prices”