Wednesday, December 31, 2014
Pope will challenge climate change deniers
By
Frank Minero
It will be circulated to the world’s 5,000 Catholic bishops
and 400,000 priests. They, in turn, will relay the message to 1.2 billion
Catholic parishioners worldwide. The edict will urge all Catholics, on both
moral and scientific grounds, to take action on climate change.
A
Papal encyclical is rare and only issued on topics the Pope deems extremely
significant. This will be the second encyclical released by Pope Francis. It’s
serious business and the Pontiff isn’t stopping there. He plans to address the
United Nations general assembly on the topic and arrange a summit of the
world’s main religions as well.
New Year's Eve bonfire tonight
Don't miss it!
The Annual Charlestown Bonfire will be held on December 31st from 4:30 - 7:00 pm at Ninigret Park. This free event is for families and friends to come together to begin their New Year’s festivities and is sponsored by Dunkin Donuts.
Bring your camera - this is a great event for photos and movies!
Financial donations will be collected for Colors for cause RI, to raise awareness of childhood cancer and help to support those families affected with this disease.
The public is also invited to participate in Colors for a Cause R.I.'s (CFAC-RI) first annual Children's Color Brigade, a lighted short march to the New Year's Eve bonfire, symbolizing the hope for a cure for all childhood cancers.
CFAC-RI will provide glow sticks for children and adults at the tennis courts at Ninigret Park, starting at 4:00 p.m. The gold firetruck will lead the procession down to the bonfire, after 4:30, in time for the lighting ceremony. CFAC-RI is a charitable organization dedicated to providing support to families battling cancer, particularly those with childhood cancer patients.
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| The monster in the fire (2011) - click to enlarge |
Bring your camera - this is a great event for photos and movies!
Financial donations will be collected for Colors for cause RI, to raise awareness of childhood cancer and help to support those families affected with this disease.
The public is also invited to participate in Colors for a Cause R.I.'s (CFAC-RI) first annual Children's Color Brigade, a lighted short march to the New Year's Eve bonfire, symbolizing the hope for a cure for all childhood cancers.
CFAC-RI will provide glow sticks for children and adults at the tennis courts at Ninigret Park, starting at 4:00 p.m. The gold firetruck will lead the procession down to the bonfire, after 4:30, in time for the lighting ceremony. CFAC-RI is a charitable organization dedicated to providing support to families battling cancer, particularly those with childhood cancer patients.
Wonder how Rhode Island would do if the state audited it’s charter schools?
A
reader informs us that the auditor of Massachusetts recently released an audit of the state’s charter schools. Our reader offers some of the
findings:
“Suzanne M. Bump, Auditor of the Commonwealth of
Massachusetts, has finished her audit of the Massachusetts Department of Elementary
and Secondary Education’s (DESE’s) oversight of the Commonwealth’s charter
school system.
“Since 1996, Massachusetts has spent $4.3 billion on
charters, and this report shows that DESE—known for its emphasis with local
public school districts on data collection and
data-driven-decision-making—doesn’t ensure (maybe they can’t) ensure the
collection, storage, security, reliability, validity or the dissemination of
THEIR data.
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
And here's Part 2 of the Year in Review
Write and send the check before tomorrow, midnight and it will count for this year's taxes
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Junk mail
How
the credit card industry is contributing to pollution
By Odysseas Papadimitriou
We all get far too much mail, especially from financial services
companies. Credit card companies alone send billions of pieces of paper
mail each year, and most of that gets thrown right into the trash can.
Not only does this dynamic pose a threat from a fraud perspective – trash cans
and mailboxes can be treasure troves for opportunistic fraudsters – but you
have to figure the effect on the environment isn’t great either.
Paper products aren’t as bad as most materials, according to North
Carolina State University Professor Richard Venditti, because they’re
renewable, recyclable and biodegradable and they motivate land owners to plant
trees. However, Venditti says, “inefficient use of paper does consume
resources and have an impact on the environment.”
Bonfire, tomorrow night
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Know the Laws Before Driving Stoned
But in many states, you don’t need to be inebriated from marijuana to actually fail such a test. Simply smoking weed a few days before could result in enough THC (the active ingredient in marijuana) to get into legal trouble on the road. Here’s what to know before you take that next puff.
Monday, December 29, 2014
Chariho Reefer Madness Redux
Tom
Gentz becomes a pin-up calendar boy
By
Will Collette
If you live within the boundaries of the Chariho School District,
chances are you recently received a copy of the Chariho Taskforce’s 2015 wall
calendar. The Taskforce, a non-profit that in my opinion has more funding than
sense, sent out this expensive mailing to promote its new slogan, “Fit In.”
I don’t know what “Fit In” is supposed to mean, but they use it as
a theme throughout the calendar.
I’m guessing this calendar may end up being hung on the wall by maybe a dozen or so people. For just about everyone else, this calendar will “Fit In” with other junk mail paper in their recycling bin.
I’m guessing this calendar may end up being hung on the wall by maybe a dozen or so people. For just about everyone else, this calendar will “Fit In” with other junk mail paper in their recycling bin.
Year in review, part 1
2014 in Review, Part 1
By Tom Tomorrow
Click here to see the rest of the "highlights" from the first half of the year.
Click here to see the rest of the "highlights" from the first half of the year.
Another study touts the benefits of Advil® for older people
Ibuprofen use leads to
extended lifespan in several species, study shows
See also: http://www.progressive-charlestown.com/2014/11/can-advil-heal-lungs-of-older-people.html#more
A
common over-the-counter drug that tackles pain and fever may also hold keys to
a longer, healthier life, according to a Texas A&M AgriLife Research
scientist.
Regular
doses of ibuprofen extended the lifespan of multiple species, according to
research published in the journal Public Library of Science, Genetics.
"We
first used baker's yeast, which is an established aging model, and noticed that
the yeast treated with ibuprofen lived longer," said Dr. Michael
Polymenis, an AgriLife Research biochemist in College Station. "Then we
tried the same process with worms and flies and saw the same extended lifespan.
Plus, these organisms not only lived longer, but also appeared healthy."
VIDEO: Why does spaghetti break into more than two pieces?
Destin, the star of the SmarterEveryDay video series, takes a very, very
slow motion look at the spaghetti-breaking oddity that led to an
Ig Nobel Prize in physics:
Energy
The Lesser Known Correlation between Recycling and Climate Change
Guest post by Anne Staley
Guest post by Anne Staley
The products we use in our daily lives impact the climate at
every stage of their lifecycle. From the way we manufacture these products to
the way we use them and even the way they’re disposed – it all has a bearing on
the climate.
If you’re wondering how human consumption has an impact on the
climate, there’s a one-word answer for it – energy. All the activities related
to consumption whether it’s manufacturing, distribution, or the management of
the resulting waste, require energy.
Where does this energy come from? It mostly comes from fossil
fuels, which are universally acknowledged as the largest source of greenhouse
gas emissions (GHG).
Sunday, December 28, 2014
Gävle Goat Lives, Wooten speaks, 2014 ends and lots of job openings
Charlestown
Tapas
By
Will Collette
Gävle Goat Lives!
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| This is how the Goat usually ends up, but not this year |
For
the first time since Progressive Charlestown started monitoring it, Sweden’s Gävle Goat (Gävlebocken) made it through the Christmas
holiday without being torched. As regular readers may recall, Gävle, Sweden has a
holiday tradition of erecting a 40-foot tall goat made of sticks and straw that stands on display in the town square throughout the Advent season.
In most years, the Gävlebocken gets burned to the ground by
vandals. But not this year.
It survived, thanks to vigilant volunteers and the idea of ringing the town square with a taxis.
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| They want to be Gavle Goats when they grow up |
The
Gävlebocken has his own blog where he makes
fun of the right-wing jerks who run the town government.
Speaking of which, the All-CCA Charlestown Town Council encourages you to attend this year’s Charlestown New Year’s Eve bonfire at 4:30 PM (on New Year’s Eve, Wednesday, of course) at Ninigret Park.
Speaking of which, the All-CCA Charlestown Town Council encourages you to attend this year’s Charlestown New Year’s Eve bonfire at 4:30 PM (on New Year’s Eve, Wednesday, of course) at Ninigret Park.
This
year, the Council has mandated that five Democrats be tossed onto the fire, but
as is their usual policy, they want the Charlestown Democratic Town
Committee to draw up a list of which five it will be.
Speaking of New
Year’s
For
the best wrap-up of the events of 2014, don’t miss Dave Barry’s 2014 Year in
Review in the Miami Herald. Click here.
Virginia Wooten
Speaks
Every
so often, the Charlestown Citizens Alliance brings their President Virginia
Wooten forward to deliver an encyclical to the CCA Party faithful. Rarely seen
or heard, Wooten’s words are to be savored much like the Oracle at Delphi. This year, she (or one of her
elves) penned a Holiday Message to Charlestown
which ran in the Westerly Sun.
In
it, Wooten declares Charlestown to be the best place in Rhode Island and tells
the faithful that “the newly elected Charlestown Town
Council members and planning commissioners will strive to achieve the type of
government that the citizens of our town expect and deserve.”
That's pretty much what Alexis de Tocqueville supposedly said with an irony not evident in Ms. Wooten's letter to the editor, when he said, "In a democracy, the people get the government they deserve." Some say the quote is misattributed and credit instead Joseph de Maistre who's 1811 line read, "every nation gets the government it deserves."
The connection between money and mental illness
Wealth, power or lack thereof at heart of many mental disorders
Donald Trump's ego may be the size of his financial empire, but that doesn't mean he's the picture of mental health.
The same can be said about the self-esteem of people who are living from paycheck to paycheck, or unemployed. New research from the University of California, Berkeley, underscores this mind-wallet connection.
UC Berkeley researchers have linked inflated or deflated
feelings of self-worth to such afflictions as bipolar disorder, narcissistic
personality disorder, anxiety and depression, providing yet more evidence that
the widening gulf between rich and poor can be bad for your health.
Boost productivity
Can
organic crops compete with industrial agriculture?
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| For more cartoons by Randall Enos, click here. |
From: UC Berkeley
A systematic overview of more than 100 studies comparing organic
and conventional farming finds that the crop yields of organic agriculture are
higher than previously thought.
The study, conducted by UC Berkeley
researchers, also found that certain practices could further shrink the
productivity gap between organic crops and conventional farming.
The study, to be published online Wednesday, Dec. 10, in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B,
tackles the lingering perception that organic farming, while offering an
environmentally sustainable alternative to chemically intensive agriculture,
cannot produce enough food to satisfy the world’s appetite.
Casualties in the class war
Classism is a problem in America.
This is nothing new; after all, we all remember the kids in school who were
made fun of for wearing off-brand clothes and shoes, who couldn’t afford to be
a part of certain activities.
I even remember that, for a while in
middle school, people used lines like “You get your clothes from Goodwill” as
an insult. So, classism is something that is so deeply ingrained in our society
that it is simply accepted, even among children, who, by nature, are generally
much more accepting than adults (unless they have been taught to be otherwise).
Saturday, December 27, 2014
The war on xmas?
For his last Christmas in office before handing the reins of
government over to Gina Raimondo, Governor Lincoln Chafee mostly avoided the
idiotic lambasting he has received in previous years over his decision to refer
to the large decorated evergreen placed in the State House rotunda as a
“Holiday Tree” rather than a “Christmas Tree.”
Locally speaking, the annual “War on Christmas” was relatively
quiet this year, mostly, I believe, because of the election and because of the
attention being given to the #BlackLivesMatter protests.
As president of the Humanists of Rhode Island, I waited until
the day after the election to formally request a spot in the State House for
our Roger Williams banner. This banner, placed for the first time in the State
House last year, has been relegated to a spot on the second floor of the State
House, in an area designated for displays by local ethnic and civic groups.
The idea of such an area is to allow a “free speech zone,” a
place for symbols and ideas of a religious nature to be displayed on public
property. In this way has the law evolved so that the separation of church and
state may be violated.
Here you will find all sorts of statements and displays about
religion. There are mangers and baby Jesuses
End-of-Year Giving? Here's a great option.
Will Match Your Gift |
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Dear Friend of the Food Bank: To help us meet the demand, the End Hunger Challenge Fund is matching gifts made to the Food Bank -- up to a total of $50,000! This means your gift will go even further to help hungry Rhode Islanders get the healthy food they need. Just use the donation link in this email to make your tax-deductible donation. The Challenge ends when 2014 comes to a close, so I urge you to make a gift now. Please donate to help get food to the 63,000 Rhode Islanders who visit our statewide network of food pantries every month. Thank you for your year-long support. Best wishes for a healthy and prosperous 2015! Sincerely, Andrew Schiff Chief Executive Officer P.S. If you’ve already made a year-end gift, you have my sincerest gratitude. Thank you so much! (401) 942-MEAL • donations@rifoodbank.org Privacy • Unsubscribe |
Thinking about end-of-year giving?
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