It's here!

New Report Shows That Climate Change Is Already Having Major Impact

By Mindy Fischer

A brand new report was released Tuesday by the U.S. government saying that climate change is already having a major impact on us, affecting both the weather and our economy. 

It seems that people who are convinced that if this is a problem at all, it is a problem for the distant future, are clearly not paying attention. This report points out serious changes going on all over the country and concludes that man-made climate change is already causing problems, and it is only strengthening.

VIDEO: Roll on

Wave Energy Treading Water in Southern N.E.

By TIM FAULKNER/ecoRI News staff

A wave-energy buoy created by URI and Electro 

Standards Laboratories can generate electricity for 

offshore and nearshore uses. 

(Photos courtesy of Electro Standards Laboratories/URI)

The eternal quest to harness the power of the sea is showing promise off the coast of southern New England, but dwindling financial and policy support have stalled efforts to bring it to market, according to the developers of this unique source of renewable energy.

Modest grants, sweat equity and student classwork, so far, have produced separate yet similar projects in Massachusetts and Rhode Island for harvesting energy from waves.

Wave-energy buoys — also called wave-energy absorbers — are in development at the School for Marine Science and Technology at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth. A second public-private partnership is ongoing between Electro Standards Laboratories (ESL) of Cranston, R.I., and the University of Rhode Island College of Engineering.

Wave buoys developed through both projects generate electricity from the constant bobbing, or heave motion, of cylinders sealed within partially submerged, watertight ballasts. The moving cylinders pump generators that deliver immediate power for onsite use.

Prototype buoys have confirmed that moderate East Coast waves have the potential to support both inshore and offshore energy needs.

Great reason to go to Ireland this month

Study of domestic cat meows, to be presented in Dublin

By Marc Abrahams, Improbable Research 

The world’s ongoing research effort to understand cat meows will center, for a shining moment in May, on Dublin, Ireland.The assembled delegates there will hear about this study:

“A Study of Human Perception of Intonation in Domestic Cat Meows,” Susanne Schötz and Joost van de Weijer, [paper to be presented at the conference] Proceedings of the 7th international conference on Speech Prosody, Dubin, Ireland, May 20-23, 2014. (Thanks to investigator Daniela Müller for bringing this to our attention.) The researchers explain:

The on-going debate over the reasons why some leave Rhode Island

College profs, conservative activists disagree on tax, migration data

By Bob Plain in Rhode Island’s Future

"The Flight of the Earls" 

Tell a lie long enough and it becomes the truth. In Rhode Island politics this has become the case with the idea that people are fleeing the Ocean State because of our uncompetitive tax structure. But a new local “think tank” has come to a decidedly different conclusion than some of the other local “think tanks” on this question.

“The academic literature is mixed on the question of whether tax rates influence where people choose to live, and research suggests that factors like employment opportunities and quality of life are more salient,” reads the report created by professors from Bryant University and Rhode Island College.

Here’s a chart from the report:

Money and Charlestown politics

The calm before the storm

By Will Collette

In Charlestown, campaign season starts for real when candidates must declare their intentions in late June. But between each general election and that declaration, Charlestown political groups position themselves by trying to raise money, with varying degrees of success.

There are only five active campaign committees in Charlestown among the dozens listed on the Board of Elections website: the Committee to Elect Rep. Donna Walsh (D), Tina Jackson (R) for State Representative, the Charlestown Democratic Town Committee, the Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA Party) and the Charlestown Republican Town Committee.

Four of these five active campaign groups filed campaign finance disclosure reports with the Board of Elections for the first quarter of 2014. Only Republican Tina Jackson failed to file, earning her yet another BOE violation, her eighth such violation in a row. According to the Board of Election’s list of delinquencies for March, Jackson owed the BOE fines totaling $4,031. The fines accumulate daily and Jackson is moving up the list (she’s now on page 2 of 5 pages).

The RISC-PAC of the RI Statewide Coalition, long based in Charlestown but now in West Warwick under the name Rhode Island Taxpayers, owes $4,319 in fines as of March.

Bored Games

By Gemma Correll in The Nib 

Lifeguard jobs still available

State beaches at Misquamicut and Matunuck open this weekend

PROVIDENCE - The Department of Environmental Management announces that four state beaches in South County will be open weekends from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. beginning this Saturday, May 10. 

Scarborough North, Roger Wheeler, East Matunuck and Misquamicut State beaches will be open Saturdays and Sundays, weather permitting, from May 10 until Memorial Day to accommodate early beach-goers and advance season pass sales. 

All state beaches will be open on a daily basis from Memorial Day, the traditional start of the summer outdoor recreation season, through Labor Day.

Charlestown police union mourns the loss of chaplain

R.I.P. Rev. Robert Cummings of Charlestown

The Washington County F.O.P. Lodge #40 - Charlestown Branch announces with deep regret the passing of Rev. Robert Cummings. 

Rev. Cummings was a charter member of the Washington County FOP-A and served as both the FOP-A and the FOP Chaplin with honor and dignity for many years.

Rev. Cummings passed away on Sunday, May 4th surrounded by his loving family.

Our Law-killers Are Back in the Saddle

The Republicans in Congress are working overtime to kill any bills that might lift up America's workaday families.

By Jim Hightower

They’re back. They’re rested. They’re ready!

I’m talking about our Congress critters. They’ve returned to their workplace after enjoying a badly needed and two-week-long Easter vacation.

After all, it had been a full four weeks since their last vacation in March, and meanwhile they’d been doing a lot of heavy lifting. You know — passing a jobs bill, raising the minimum wage, and extending long-term unemployment benefits for millions of desperate folks who’ve been unable to find jobs.

Yessiree, our legislative leaders have been working like mules to strengthen America’s hard-hit middle class.

Oh, wait. My mistake. They haven’t passed any of that stuff. In fact, the GOP-ruled House and Senate Republicans have been working overtime to kill any bills that might lift up America’s workaday families.

Charlestown's Ryan Bate....He won!

For the Second Year Running, a Rhode Islander Wins PETA's Contest

By  Shakira Croce

 

Providence, R.I. — Rhode Island native Ryan Bate wears many hats: He's the owner and director of a women's-only boot camp, a fitness expert and trainer, and, now, PETA's Sexiest Vegan Next Door. Beating out hundreds of contestants from across the country, including nine other hot male finalists, Bate will enjoy a free vacation for two to Maui, Hawaii, courtesy of HumaneTrip.com.

"Not only is Ryan fit and gorgeous, he's also the kind of guy who rescues strays and puts indoor insects safely back outside," says PETA Special Projects Manager Alicia Woempner. "He leads by example through his energy, compassion, and zest for life."

Bate was born in West Warwick and grew up in West Greenwich. Currently residing in Charlestown with his wife, Danielle, who is also vegan, Bate made the switch to a plant-based diet after watching PETA's video "Meet Your Meat" and says he's never looked back. 

New Poll Shows Rhode Island Voters Strongly Favor Wildlife Protection Bills

Rhode Island voters support the phase out of lead ammunition for hunting and a ban on the use of cruel training devices on elephants
Naseem Amini, HSUS

A statewide survey reveals Rhode Island voters support legislation to require the use of non-lead ammunition for the taking of wildlife, by more than a two-to-one margin.

Rep. Arthur Handy, D-18, and Sen. Joshua Miller, D-28, have introduced H 7838 / S 2628 which will protect Rhode Island’s rich natural resource by phasing out the use of toxic lead ammunition for hunting which poisons wildlife. The poll found that 62 percent of Rhode Island voters favor such a phase-out, while only 28 percent oppose it.

Such patriots!

Ten Negative Messages The Republican Party Is Sending To America’s Kids

What lessons are republican representatives teaching
America’s kids? Here are ten of the worst things the right
wing role models for our children.  Pat Bagley, Salt Lake Tribune

By RANDA MORRIS

Republicans complain about video games and Hollywood, routinely whining that the influence of the mainstream media on the next generation is ‘destroying America.’ 

They claim that the ‘unGodly‘ and the ‘sexually immoral’ are encouraging young people to become degenerate, God hating heathens, bound for eternal damnation.

You can't say that

Let's talk about checks

By Jen Sorenson

Click here to see what all the hub-bub is about

Brown study says “beware the Sesarma!”

Crabs killing Northeast saltmarshes, study confirms

Science Daily

A marathon summer of field work by Mark Bertness, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, and a squadron of students may finally help settle the heated debate about what's killing the coastal saltmarshes of southern New England and Long Island. The group's work has yielded two new papers that offer clear evidence of the cause.

In one paper, published March 20 in the journal PLoS ONE, they provide the results of numerous measurements at 14 sites around Rhode Island's Narragansett Bay. They sought correlations between the extent of marsh death and evidence of any of several popular hypotheses. The winner by far was runaway herbivory of cordgrass by the Sesarma crab.

In the other study, published in the journal Ecology Letters, they directly tested that hypothesis with experiments on Cape Cod. The results were that wherever they protected Sesarma from the pressure of predators, the crabs ruthlessly mowed the grasses down.

MIA In The War On Cancer

Where Are The Low-Cost Treatments?
by Jake Bernstein, ProPublica
This story was co-published with The Daily Beast

Michael Retsky awoke from surgery to bad news. The tumor in his colon had spread to four of his lymph nodes and penetrated the bowel wall. When Retsky showed the pathology report to William Hrushesky, his treating oncologist, the doctor exclaimed, "Mamma mia."

"Michael had a mean looking cancer," Hrushesky remembers.

Retsky didn't need anyone to tell him his prognosis. Although trained as a physicist, he had switched careers to cancer research in the early 1980s and spent more than a decade modeling the growth of breast cancer tumors. During his treatment, he joined the staff of one of the most prestigious cancer research labs in the country.