Yes, the government can track your location – but usually not by spying on you directly

Your cell phone tells them where you are

Emilee Rader, University of Wisconsin-Madison

If you use a mobile phone with location services turned on, it is likely that data about where you live and work, where you shop for groceries, where you go to church and see your doctor, and where you traveled to over the holidays is up for sale. And U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is one of the customers.

The U.S. government doesn’t need to collect data about people’s locations itself, because your mobile phone is already doing it. While location data is sometimes collected as part of a mobile phone app’s intended use, like for navigation or to get a weather forecast, more often locations are collected invisibly in the background.

I am a privacy researcher who studies how people understand and make decisions about data that is collected about them, and I research new ways to help consumers get back some control over their privacy. Unfortunately, once you give an app or webpage permission to collect location data, you no longer have control over how the data is used and shared, including who the data is shared with or sold to.

Every time we debate taxing the rich in Rhode Island, this issue comes up

What the data shows about threats of a tax exodus by the wealthy

Cristobal Young, Cornell University

New York’s mayor-elect, Zohran Mamdani, campaigned on a promise to raise the city’s income tax on its richest residents from 3.9% to 5.9%. Combined with the state income tax, which is 10.9% for the top bracket, the increase would cement the city’s position as having the highest taxes on top earners in the country.

It set off a chorus of warnings about the tax flight of the city’s wealthiest residents.

Hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman claimed that both the city’s businesses and wealthy residents “have already started making arrangements for the exits.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul echoed the concern, opposing the proposal “because we cannot have them leave the state.” Before the election, Mamdani’s opponent, former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, joked that if Mamdani won, “even I will move to Florida.”

I research whether high earners actually move when their taxes go up. My colleagues and I have analyzed millionaire taxes in New Jersey and California, the migration of Forbes billionaires globally and decades of IRS data tracing where Americans with million-dollar incomes live.

Top earners are often thought of as “mobile millionaires” who are ever searching for lower-tax places to live. In reality, they’re often reluctant to leave the places where they built their careers and raised their families.

At the same time, there are grains of truth in the tax migration arguments, so it’s important to carefully parse the evidence.

King Donald and his Xmas wish list

It's for real.

Rep. Spears holds community meeting, December 13

 

DECEMBER 2025

You're Invited!

Saturday, December 13 1 PM – 3 PM

Please join us for a Community Conversation with State Representative Tina Spears and special guest, Speaker of the House Joe Shekarchi

Saturday, December 13 1 PM – 3 PM Cross mIlls Public Library, 4417 Old Post Road, Charlestown, RI

Tina will share updates on what she has accomplished this year and give a preview of the key issues ahead in 2026… more importantly, she and Speaker Shekarchi want to hear from YOU.   This is an opportunity to discuss the issues that matter most to our community, ask questions, and share your thoughts on priorities for the upcoming legislative session.   Your voice is essential in shaping our work—hope to see you there!   Light refreshments will be provided

If you'd like to donate to Tina's re-eelction campaign, please make personal checks payable to: The Friends of Tina Spears 82 Hillside Drive Charlestown, RI 02813   Or click HERE to contribute online or use the QR code   DONATE

Why we believe in crazy stuff

Flat Earth, spirits and conspiracy theories – experience can shape even extraordinary beliefs

A belief in ghosts could be a way to explain a strange
experience while asleep. 
'The Nightmare' by Johann Heinrich Füssli/
Wikimedia Commons

Eli Elster, University of California, Davis

On Feb. 22, 2020, “Mad” Mike Hughes towed a homemade rocket to the Mojave Desert and launched himself into the sky. His goal? To view the flatness of the Earth from space. This was his third attempt, and tragically it was fatal. Hughes crashed shortly after takeoff and died.

Hughes’ nickname – Mad Mike – might strike you as apt. Is it not crazy to risk your life fighting for a theory that was disproven in ancient Greece?

But Hughes’ conviction, though striking, is not unique. Across all recorded cultures, people have held strong beliefs that seemed to lack evidence in their favor – one might refer to them as “extraordinary beliefs.”

For evolutionary anthropologists like me, the ubiquity of these kinds of beliefs is a puzzle. Human brains evolved to form accurate models of the world. Most of the time, we do a pretty good job. So why do people also often adopt and develop beliefs that lack strong supporting evidence?

In a new review in the journal Trends in Cognitive Sciences, I propose a simple answer. People come to believe in flat Earth, spirits and microchipped vaccines for the same reasons they come to believe in anything else. Their experiences lead them to think those beliefs are true.

A cure for cancer at hand...unless Trump and Bobby Jr. block it

Scientists Close In on a Universal Cancer Vaccine

By University of Massachusetts Amherst

A research team at the University of Massachusetts Amherst has shown that a nanoparticle-based vaccine can successfully prevent melanoma, pancreatic cancer, and triple-negative breast cancer in mice. Depending on the cancer type, as many as 88 percent of vaccinated mice remained free of tumors (depending on the cancer), and the approach reduced—and in some instances entirely blocked—the spread of cancer in the body.

“By engineering these nanoparticles to activate the immune system via multi-pathway activation that combines with cancer-specific antigens, we can prevent tumor growth with remarkable survival rates,” says Prabhani Atukorale, assistant professor of biomedical engineering in the Riccio College of Engineering at UMass Amherst and corresponding author on the paper.

Atukorale’s earlier work found that her nanoparticle-based drug design could shrink or eliminate existing tumors in mice. The new results reveal that the same technology also works as a preventative strategy.

How to win elections and influence the State House? Right-wing League of RI Businesses has a plan.

Pro-gun business PAC targets local Dems Tina Spears and Alana DiMario

By Nancy Lavin, Rhode Island Current

The League of RI Businesses organized a fundraiser wine
tasting at Gasbarro’s Wines on Federal Hill in
Providence on Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025.
From left, John Loughlin, a Republican candidate for
lieutenant governor; Laura Turini, a Democratic
candidate for state Senate District 35;
David Levesque, co-founder of The League;
Leah Boisclair, a Democratic candidate for
House District 36; and Mark Mesrobian, a
Democratic candidate for Senate District 36.
(Photo by Michael Salerno/Rhode Island Current)

When a group of gun rights advocates piled into House Speaker K. Joseph Shekarchi’s State House office to rail against a proposed assault-style weapons ban last spring, Shekarchi gave them some advice: Organize. Get involved earlier. Don’t come in at the last minute and complain.

David Levesque took the message to heart.

“If it wasn’t for the Speaker sitting in that conference room six or seven months ago, telling us ‘you need to be organized, you need to do this for the long fight,’ we probably wouldn’t be here now,” Levesque, a Narragansett resident and owner of Brewed Awakenings coffee houses, said in a recent interview.

Levesque got to work. He revived a dormant political action committee started during the pandemic to “fight against all the ridiculous rules and laws.” He made a website, registered the 501(c)4 with the Rhode Island Department of State, held fundraisers, and started to recruit 2026 state legislative candidates. 

The pièce de résistance: a string of 40 political action committees — one statewide and one for every city and town in Rhode Island — allowing The League of RI Businesses to circumvent the $2,000-per-candidate annual campaign donation limit set by state law. 

“With 40 PACs aligned in mission, The League has the capacity to direct up to $1 million annually toward supporting new, common-sense candidates and challenging extremist incumbents,” the business group boasted in a Nov. 17 press release. 

The Westerly School Committee is caught in a bigoted, Christian nationalist time loop

A small number of loud bigots (and at least one school committee member) pound away at the rights of transgender, gender-diverse, and transitioning students.

Steve Ahlquist

From the amount of time I spend attending and covering the Westerly School Committee and hearing the nonstop anti-transgender rhetoric, one might think that this is somehow a major issue in the town. The best I can tell? It’s not. 

Instead, a small number of Christian nationalist bigots, chief among them Westerly resident Robert Chiaradio, cycle through the same litany of imagined grievances like a skipping record. Chiaradio, I think, gets so much airplay because one of the members of the Westerly School Committee, Lori Wycall, keeps adding agenda items to the meeting with the intent of somehow circumventing Rhode Island state law and opening the door to abusing the rights of transgender students.

To understand what follows, you need to know that at the November 19 Westerly School Committee meeting, the minutes of the November 5 meeting were amended so that quotation marks were placed around the term “biological males” as used by Robert Chiaradio during his comments. This was done because the term is demeaning to trans people and has no scientific meaning. [See this footnote.¹] Chiaradio opposed the quotation marks.

Robert Chiaradio: A speaker asked this body to amend the minutes of the November 5 meeting by placing quotation marks around the term “biological male” as I used it at that meeting to describe males who are confused about their sexual identities. The speaker deemed the term derogatory.

I ask anyone in this room with a modicum of common sense, what is derogatory about this term - “biological male” - as used in reference to the above-mentioned population?

Is it unpopular with some people? Yes, it is.

Does it describe the group in a manner in which it doesn’t wish to be described, or those who support it don’t wish it to be described? Yes.

Does it belittle, diminish, or disparage anyone in the group, or show a critical or disrespectful attitude toward anyone in this group? No, it does not.

The term is truthful, honest, and sincere to all populations. I submit to you that calling males identifying as females, “females,” belittles and diminishes real, honest-to-goodness females and disrespects them. That’s what gets lost in all of this. And your desire to minimize and manipulate the truth. Not only are people like myself (who, like it or not, are truth-tellers) disparaged, lied about, threatened, et cetera (which I don’t care about), but our real females, Westerly’s real girls, are diminished and marginalized, as was the case in 2024 … where a “biological male” played against Westerly’s girls - an incident that this superintendent and many in power continue to deny.

Later in the minutes of the November 19 meeting, during the consent agenda, Mr. Killam, in true gutless fashion, I might add, made a motion to amend the November 5 minutes to, as the speaker requested, place quotation marks around the term “biological male.” Without Mrs. Wycall and Mr. Jackson, the motion passed five-to-nothing.

Ms. Dunn even said, We will do our best not to reinforce negative language.” Negative language? I ask you, what is negative, Ms. Dunn, about the term “biological male” being used to describe males who are confused with their sexual identities? Is it better to affirm a lie and call them females? There is only one way to describe them, and that is the truthful way, but the majority of this committee and its superintendent have an aversion to truth, and have for at least the last five plus years. To you, it’s not the truth that matters. It’s not the law that matters. It’s your agenda that matters. I’m not surprised at Ms. Goathals or Ms. Dunn or even Mr. Ober, but Mr. Nero, you’re just a flat-out disappointment who’s afraid to do the right thing.

Mr. Killam, I cannot figure you out. I think your heart is in the right place, but you lack courage. You’re a pleaser. You’re not a leader. You actually amended the minutes because you didn’t want this committee associated with a truthful term. What is derogatory about the truth? Truth is not subjective; it is not malleable. Truth is not debatable. Truth is absolute. It is objective. It is immutable and irrefutable. It’s not my truth or your truth, but the truth. If you people up there on the dais care about the population being discussed here, you will stop affirming this lie and help them get the mental health counseling they need, like I am doing. You know what the truth is, but the truth finishes a distant third with this crew, behind agenda fulfillment and cowardice. Shame on those of you who perpetuate this lie. Thank you.

Committee Chair Leslie Dunn: Is there anyone else who would like to address the committee? Seeing none, I will ask if committee members wish to respond.

Committeemember Timothy Killam: Okay, so first of all, let’s talk a couple things... I made the motion to [put the term] in quotes because it was [Robert Chiaradio’s] statement - that’s what the discussion was.

If you’re going to ask me if I feel that the term “biological male” or “biological female” is derogatory, my answer is “No, it is not.” And if you actually dig deeper, as I did today, you kind of end up in a rabbit hole. I went to the Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE)’s guidance on transgender and gender nonconforming students - I know that’s a whole other battle - but in numerous places, RIDE lists students as “biological male” or “biological female.” It’s just a term our department of ed uses, so I don’t think it’s derogatory.

It may be used in a derogatory manner in some instances, but the overall term “biological male or female,” no, I do not feel that it is that.

I want to make it clear that this is not why I changed the minutes, not at all. I changed them because it wasn’t clear what the statement meant. But I can tell you that maybe I was wrong, because you could have just watched the video and seen it for yourself. Very simple. Maybe that’s what we need to do: start scaling back our minutes. [For example,] tonight, “Mr. Chiaradio spoke, discussion ensued.” That’s all [the minutes] need to say. You can watch it on video if you want to.

He's all over it

Under Trump, once prestigious Kennedy Center awards become self parody

See suppressed, Oscar-winning documentary, December 13

 

Reserve your spot HERE. “No Other Land,” an audacious and devastating film, was also 2024’s most decorated documentary.  Its subject — the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — couldn’t be more consequential, and its approach, which includes a directorial team of two Israelis and two Palestinians, feels genuinely daring and bold.  “No Other Land "was unable to find a distributor in the United States, and producers eventually opted to self-distribute. In the very recent past, such a movie would often find a home with a major streamer, like Max or Netflix.  This is your chance to see it.

Trump regime desperate to cancel wind projects

Trump Interior Dept. to consider revoking New England Wind 1 approval

By Anastasia E. Lennon, Rhode Island Current

This story originally ran in The New Bedford Light.

The federal agency regulating offshore wind development asked a federal judge to allow it to reconsider a key approval — one the same agency granted just last year — for New England Wind 1, a project planned off the Massachusetts coast.

If the federal government’s request is granted, it would be a blow to the project, which plans to invest in New Bedford and use the city for long-term project operations. If the approval stands, the project could move toward construction once it secures a power purchase agreement with the commonwealth.

This is at least the third time the administration has sought a remand of an offshore wind project approval, the others being for SouthCoast Wind and Maryland’s US Wind. The permits give major infrastructure projects the certainty to secure financing and move forward with construction.

The filing comes more than two months after the federal government signaled it would take such action against this project. The remand request was expected sooner, but the weekslong government shutdown pushed the deadline.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management filed the motion as part of a lawsuit brought in May by offshore wind opposition group ACK for Whales and other parties, including the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head Aquinnah, against BOEM and the Interior Department’s approval of New England Wind 1.

This latest move illustrates how Donald Trump’s administration is using lawsuits brought by municipalities and activist groups as a tool to crack down on the industry. Of the more than 20 actions and orders issued since January, one directed federal attorneys to review pending litigation against projects and consider a remand of permits that the litigation contests.

Vaccine committee votes to scrap universal hepatitis B shots for newborns despite outcry from children’s health experts

Against medical advice and with no scientific evidence, Bobby Jr.'s hand-picked committee set course for increased Hepatitis B infections

David Higgins, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

Even in Texas, vaccination is recommended

The committee advising the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on vaccine policy voted on Dec. 5, 2025, to stop recommending that all newborns be routinely vaccinated against the hepatitis B virus – undoing a 34-year prevention strategy that has nearly eliminated early childhood hepatitis B infections in the United States.

Before the U.S. began vaccinating all infants at birth with the hepatitis B vaccine in 1991, around 18,000 children every year contracted the virus before their 10th birthday – about half of them at birth. About 90% of that subset developed a chronic infection.

In the U.S., 1 in 4 children chronically infected with hepatitis B will die prematurely from cirrhosis or liver cancer.

Today, fewer than 1,000 American children or adolescents contract the virus every year – a 95% drop. Fewer than 20 babies each year are reported infected at birth.

I am a pediatrician and preventive medicine specialist who studies vaccine delivery and policy. Vaccinating babies for hepatitis B at birth remains one of the clearest, most evidence-based ways to keep American children free of this lifelong, deadly infection.

What spurred the change?

In September 2025, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP, an independent panel of experts that advises the CDC, debated changing the recommendation for a dose of the hepatitis B vaccine at birth, but ultimately delayed the vote.

This committee regularly reviews vaccine guidance. However, since Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. disbanded the entire committee and handpicked new members, its activity has drastically departed from business as usual. The committee has long-standing procedures for evaluating evidence on the risks and benefits of vaccines, but these procedures were not followed in the September meeting and were not followed for this most recent decision.

The committee’s new recommendation keeps the hepatitis B vaccine at birth for infants whose mothers test positive for the virus. But the committee now advises that infants whose mothers test negative should consult with their health care provider. Parents and health care providers are instructed to weigh vaccine benefits, vaccine risks and infection risks using “individual-based decision-making” or “shared clinical decision-making.”

Trump issues new official National Security Strategy that is Russia-friendly and anti-Europe

Russia applauds new strategy saying it is in line with Kremlin goals

Brad Reed

BBC headline

The Trump administration on Thursday released its official National Security Strategy, and many critics noted that it was loaded with rhetoric frequently used by white nationalists.

Some of the most inflammatory rhetoric in the document is aimed at US-allied European countries that supposedly face “the real and more stark prospect of civilizational erasure” within the next 20 years.

In particular, the document accuses the European Union of enacting policies “that undermine political liberty and sovereignty, migration policies that are transforming the continent and creating strife, censorship of free speech and suppression of political opposition, cratering birthrates, and loss of national identities and self-confidence.”

The document goes on to claim that “should present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less,” while emphasizing that US policy is to help “Europe to remain European, to regain its civilizational self-confidence, and to abandon its failed focus on regulatory suffocation.”