News Updates

Serra court date postponed; Watson trial date set; and more
By Will Collette

Terri Serra Court Appearance Postponed. The pre-trial appearance of former Chariho School Committee member for Richmond Terri Serra on the charge of violating the state social host law has been postponed until December 1. Serra was charged by Richmond Police after a horrific car crash in Charlestown on October 23rd critically injured four boys who had been at a teen underage drinking party at Serra's home. More details here. Serra faces a separate Charlestown Police charge for failing to render aid based on witness reports that she went to the scene of the accident, yelled at the injured kids and then left the scene without offering aid or calling 911.

Watson's Connecticut mug shot

Rep. Bob Watson will go to trial. Former House minority leader Rep. Bob Watson (R-East Greenwich) will go to trial on charges of driving under the influence and possession of controlled substances. Watson's attorney told the judge in New Haven, CT that there was no "resolution" (i.e. plea deal) in the case stemming from Watson's arrest at an East Haven sobriety checkpoint. Watson failed field sobriety tests. Police found marijuana in Watson's car and, later, Watson's blood tests were positive for marijuana and cocaine. Watson claims he had not smoked marijuana before driving, though he did admit it was his - he claimed he was using it medicinally for a health condition, but is not a licensed medical marijuana user. He denied cocaine use. He claims the police in Connecticut were out to get him because he is a Rhode Island legislator. No trial date has been set.

Rep. Carnevale pleads not guilty to rape charges. Rep. John Carnevale (D-Johnston) appeared in court today to plead not guilty to multiple sexual assault charges stemming from his indictment last month by a grand jury. Carnevale, a retired Providence police officer with a troubled history, was released on $50,000 bail..

Conservatives save Christmas from godless bureaucrats. The Drudge Report, Fox News and the right-wing blogosphere went nuts over reports of a (brace yourself) new tax. And this new tax was described in many of the stories in the wingnut media as "Obama's Tax on Christmas!" The rhetoric got so super-heated that this "Xmas tax" was actually withdrawn before it was ever put into effect. Was this a grand victory for the wingnuts?

Well, technically, it was. But actually it was a victory for gross stupidity and distorted reporting. Here's the deal with the "tax on Christmas." It turns out that American Christmas tree growers wanted the US Dept of Agriculture to create a promotion board similar to other boards that promote certain agricultural products (remember the long-running "Got Milk?" campaign or the TV ads for beef). These agricultural boards fund themselves by levying a fee on fellow producers to pay for promotion of their products. In the case of the tree growers, they wanted to tax themselves 15 cents per tree so they could run ads promoting the merits of buying live Christmas trees. The USDA would collect the money for the producers to use for tree buying promotion.

Because of the uproar over the "Christmas Tax," the USDA announced that it would  "postpone" the industry's self-imposed levy. If the Obama Administration and the USDA did anything wrong here, it was to fail to pay attention to the timing of the action and to underestimate how insane the wingnuts are.

Except now the Christmas tree growers are angry - although their anger seemed to be correctly focused on the right-wing nuts who killed their plans for a promotional program.

Congress not winning popularity contest. According to a recent New York Times/CBS poll, only 9% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing. Putting that approval rating in context: that's 4% better than Fidel Castro and a tie with Venezuela's leader Hugo Chavez. But by contrast, 15% of Americans approve of Paris Hilton. Lawyers as a profession draw a 29% approval rating. And the IRS comes in at 40%.