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Monday, March 18, 2024

Taylor Swift inspires new MAGA fever dream

Steve Bannon’s latest theory on Taylor Swift is the craziest conspiracy yet

By Walter Einenkel for Daily Kos

Former Donald Trump adviser Steve Bannon has a new addition for the right-wing conspiracy theory world. During an interview with former Breitbart editor Raheem Kassam on “Bannon’s War Room podcast,” the two men talked about the obstacles facing Trump this election season, including the psychological operator Taylor Swift.

If you don’t know, according to conspiracists, Taylor Swift is not-so-secretly being used by deep-state forces hellbent on reelecting President Joe Biden. Bannon plussed-up the conspiracy theory by implying that Swift’s successful tour’s dates were not coincidental. Cue dramatic sting!d More

BANNON: 

This is the Taylor Swift situation. I don't believe in coincidences. Her tour, which is the biggest tour, I think, in music history, stops on 20 August and doesn't pick back up until mid-November, early to mid-November. To be fully available after Labor Day to do whatever. And she's pretty adamant. 

She got involved in the ‘22 midterms, and Taylor Swift, with TikTok in back, is a formidable presence. And anybody that doesn't believe that, I don't think is looking at the demographic and the power she has with that demographic.

Hey Supremes! Is this "insurrectionist" enough for ya?

Trump's new campaign theme: "Elect me or I'll kill you."

DEM, RI Seafood Marketing Collaborative Accepting Applications for New Microgrant Pilot Program to Support Local Seafood Businesses and Commercial Fishing Industry

$5000 grants to boost seafood. Short deadline: March 22

The Department of Environmental Management (DEM) and the Rhode Island Seafood Marketing Collaborative, a public-private body chaired by DEM, are accepting grant applications for a new Commercial Fishing Microgrant Pilot Program.

Small competitive grants up to $5,000 will be awarded to eligible seafood businesses and commercial fishers to bolster their efforts in the commercial fishing industry. 

The pilot program aims to provide support to commercial fishers, allowing them to focus their efforts on expanding landings and building their businesses from declines experienced during COVID-19 pandemic. 

Eligible applicants include seafood business such as dealers, processors, commercial fishers, and for-hire fishers. Eligible grant projects include technology updates, equipment purchases, safety equipment, training for new staff, and other expenses that would otherwise inhibit commercial fishers from expanding their businesses. 

Applications will be accepted until Friday, March 22. For additional details and information on how to submit an application, please visit here

Gas stoves can be hazardous to your health

Gas Stoves Make for Toxic Roommates

CALEB HEERINGA for Common Dreams

There’s nothing worse than a toxic roommate. But those of us with “natural” gas in our homes may be living with them without ever knowing it.

That’s why the Gas Leaks Project launched “Hot & Toxic,” a national campaign to inform consumers of the dangers of so-called “natural” gas. Using reality TV tropes to personify the 21 toxins emitted by gas stoves, one unsuspecting homeowner must face the reality that her dream home with a gas hookup is far from ideal.

At the Gas Leaks Project, our goal is to spread the word about the harms of “natural” gas and fight the fossil fuel industry’s disinformation machine. Hot & Toxic is our biggest effort yet to flip the script and alert people that no matter what the industry says, gas isn’t clean energy.

As part of the campaign, we’re asking the Consumer Product Safety Commission to require gas stove manufacturers and retailers to put appropriate warning labels on gas stoves. People deserve access to accurate health information so they can make an informed decision when buying their next stove.

Red Tape, Hurdles Slow Rollout of R.I.’s Income-Eligible Heat Pump Program

We need to upgrade the efficiency of this program!

By Rob Smith / ecoRI News staff

Sam Westman can’t wait to get away from home heating oil.

Westman is a longtime Newport resident; he’s owned his home, just blocks from Newport Hospital, since he was 17, after inheriting it from a family member. His two-floor house dates back to the 19th century, and has an aging furnace in the basement that Westman said he’s looking to replace with a system of electric heat pumps.

His hot water heater is already electric, and he has concerns about some of the fumes coming from his furnace. Westman’s daughter, born premature, has a severe case of asthma, and switching to electric heat could improve the air quality in their home.

In October, just a month after it launched, Westman applied for the income-eligible incentive in the Clean Heat RI program, the state’s new financial assistance fund for homeowners and businesses currently using propane or heating oil looking to make the transition to electric heat.

His household was already enrolled in Rhode Island’s Low Income Heating Assistance Program (LIHEAP), which qualified him automatically for the income-eligible incentives. The incentive covers the cost of the heat pumps and installation.

“It was not affordable to me without the Clean Heat income eligibility program,” Westman said.

Despite being live for six months, the rollout of Clean Heat RI’s financial incentives for income-eligible residents is slow. Gov. Dan Mckee announced in 2022 he was allocating $25 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds to create the incentives.

The program has paid out 747 rebates since September, totaling just over $5 million. Only six of those, however, have been to income-eligible homeowners. An additional two are listed as reserved, meaning the homeowners are in the design state, but no money has been issued.

The program notably excludes a huge swath of the state; it’s currently only open to homes and businesses that heat using propane or heating oil. More than half the state relies on natural gas for heating, and those homes are not eligible for the program’s incentives.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

The dire need to reform RI's open records law

Full and timely disclosure necessary to build public trust

By John Marion, Rhode Island Current

The Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA Party) weaponized
the APRA to cover up its shady land deals. Here is
one of many examples where ex-Town Administrator Mark
Stankiewicz abused loopholes in the law to hide information
from the public. 
The emergency closure of the Washington Bridge has wrought havoc for many Rhode Islanders. The traffic has been unfathomably bad. The government’s response has been lackluster at best. The adverse effects on East Providence businesses have been severe. I personally spent over four hours in traffic on that fateful December day when the bridge was first shut down. 

Earlier this year, several news outlets sent the Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT) public records requests seeking information about the agency’s response to the bridge closure. The RIDOT charged WPRI 12 and the Providence Journal hundreds of dollars for access to the records — and, strangely, did not charge the Boston Globe at all. 

Following reporting about the inequitable fines, and the public outcry those stories yielded, Gov. Dan McKee ordered the RIDOT to give the news outlets a refund. Several news outlets appealed their charges to Attorney General Peter Neronha but his office responded that under the current law they couldn’t force the fines to be waived.

Though this is the most recent and high-profile case of an agency charging a news outlet for records, it’s certainly not the first. As noted by WPRI, the Boston Globe previously disclosed that it paid $229 for records used in a recent article about sexual harassment complaints made against an Ethics Commission nominee. 

As inconvenient, poorly-planned, and downright annoying as this bridge closure has been for all of us, there is a single silver-lining to this catastrophe: It has made Rhode Islanders concerned about public records access for the first time in over a decade. 

And fortunately, our lawmakers have the opportunity to make key improvements to the Access to Public Records Act (APRA) this session. Sen. Lou DiPalma and Rep. Patricia Serpa have introduced legislation that would overhaul the APRA. 

Do you want fries with that?


 

Likelihood around 100%

Why Covid Patients Who Could Most Benefit From Paxlovid Still Aren’t Getting It

The lingering effects of anti-vaxxers

 

(JOE RAEDLE/GETTY IMAGES)
Evangelical minister Eddie Hyatt believes in the healing power of prayer but “also the medical approach.” So on a February evening a week before scheduled prostate surgery, he had his sore throat checked out at an emergency room near his home in Grapevine, Texas.

A doctor confirmed that Hyatt had covid-19 and sent him to CVS with a prescription for the antiviral drug Paxlovid, the generally recommended medicine to fight covid. Hyatt handed the pharmacist the script, but then, he said, “She kept avoiding me.”

She finally looked up from her computer and said, “It’s $1,600.”

The generally healthy 76-year-old went out to the car to consult his wife about their credit card limits. “I don’t think I’ve ever spent more than $20 on a prescription,” the astonished Hyatt recalled.

That kind of sticker shock has stunned thousands of sick Americans since late December, as Pfizer shifted to commercial sales of Paxlovid. Before then, the federal government covered the cost of the drug.

The price is one reason Paxlovid is not reaching those who need it most. And patients who qualify for free doses, which Pfizer offers under an agreement with the federal government, often don’t realize it or know how to get them.

Eating Refined Carbs Reduces Your Facial Attractiveness – Regardless of BMI or Age

It's a bad look

By PLOS  

A recent study has found that consuming refined carbohydrates may negatively affect facial attractiveness, as determined by opposite-sex ratings. 

The research highlights the potential social consequences of dietary choices, emphasizing the need for further exploration into how nutrition influences perceived attractiveness and other social characteristics.

Consuming high-glycemic foods both short-term and long-term was linked to lower attractiveness scores, regardless of other variables like body mass index (BMI) and age.

A recent research project has discovered a statistical link between the amount of refined carbohydrates consumed by individuals and their perceived facial attractiveness, as evaluated by heterosexual volunteers of the opposite sex. This study, conducted by Visine and their team at the University of Montpellier in France, was published in the open-access journal PLOS ONE.

The Western diet consists of high levels of refined carbohydrates—foods processed in ways that typically remove much of their nutritional value, such as white flour, table sugar, and ingredients in many packaged snacks.

Can witches fly?

Definitely NOT in flying cars!


One of the earliest depictions of flying witches is in a
15th-century text entitled “Le champion des dames,” or
“The Defender of Ladies.” Martin Le Franc/W. Schild. Die
Maleficia der Hexenleut' via Wikimedia Commons
The image of a witch flying on a broomstick is iconic, but it is not nearly as old as the idea of witchcraft itself, which dates to the earliest days of humankind.

Several theologians, church inquisitors, secular magistrates and other authorities first wrote about such flight in the early 1400s. 

The earliest known visual depiction of flying witches appears in a 1451 manuscript copy of one such text, “Le champion des dames” (“The Defender of Ladies”), by the French poet Martin Le Franc.

Witchcraft accusations at this time were increasingly focused on women. The clothing of the figures in Le Franc’s text depicts them as coming from non-elite ranks of medieval society. So do the implements on which they fly. Staffs and brooms were tools for ordinary housework.

The notion that witches could fly served to support the idea that they gathered in large groups called sabbaths. These gatherings, in turn, heightened the supposed threat witches posed to Christian society.

Even after the idea of witches flying on brooms was introduced to European society, it was not readily accepted. Many who wrote about witchcraft at this time, including Le Franc, were quite skeptical about the reality of flying witches.

As it turned out, however, authorities could still perceive a threat even if they believed witches’ flight was imaginary.

Saturday, March 16, 2024

'Shrinkflation' Playing Crucial Role in Rising Prices, Corporate Profits: Analysis

Sneaky way to bump up the cost of everything

JULIA CONLEY for Common Dreams

Executives in corporate earnings meetings call it "price pack architecture," but economic justice advocates, Democrats in Congress, and in recent days, Cookie Monster of "Sesame Street" have a different term for companies' practice of reducing the weight or size of a product while charging the same amount for it: shrinkflation.

Major corporations like PepsiCo and Utz have not only kept prices high even as pandemic era supply chain and labor issues have eased—a practice recognized as "greedflation"—but have also increasingly been reducing the size of products like snacks, drinks, and even essentials like toilet paper rolls, a new analysis from Groundwork Collaborative shows.

Nyet

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