State House Soup Kitchen puts focus on the poor
Around 70 activists and homeless people gathered at the State House for a Jobs With Justice-sponsored “State House Soup Kitchen” aimed to get state lawmakers to invest in jobs, housing, transportation, and ending hunger. Kicking off slightly later than its 3:30 p.m. starting time, speakers covered a wide range of anti-poverty topics including raising taxes [...]
Senator: ‘Darth Flanders bit’ insults Central Falls
In a post yesterday about Bob Flanders poking fun of his role as the “lord of the pink slip” in Central Falls (check out the video of Flanders singing if you haven’t yet), I mentioned that it wasn’t in good taste for Flanders to make jokes about a situation that has dire consequences to already-struggling [...]
Bill would raise minimum wage in Rhode Island
You’ll often hear the mantra that Rhode Island has one of the highest tax rates in New England. Well, on the other side of economic spectrum, we also have the second lowest minimum wage in New England. But Rep. David Bennett, D-Warwick, sponsored a bill that would raise Rhode Island’s minimum wage from $7.40 to [...]
Occupy PVD to protest Pfizer, ALEC today
Occupy Providence crosses state lines today for a protest at a Pfizer facility in Groton, Conn. The action is being endorsed by several Occupy groups from Connecticut and Massachusetts, and will include “protest, street theater, puppetry, teach-ins, speakers, music, food, and more,” according to a press release sent this morning. “Pfizer feels it is their [...]
My Pre-Existing Condition: The Price of Being Female
Will I get pregnant one day? I don’t know for sure, but you know who thinks they do . . . health insurance companies? I didn’t think it possible for an insurer to know whether I was going to get pregnant before I did, but remarkably, insurance companies seem to believe they know best. And [...]
Poll: Not looking good for Democrat David Cicilline
The big story to come out of WPRI’s poll last night is that Republican challenger Brendan Doherty is “crushing” incumbent Democrat David Cicilline in their contest for the right to represent Rhode Island in the 1st Congressional District. According to the poll that surveyed 250 Rhode Islanders, Doherty would garner 49 percent of the vote [...]
Lecture on new era of ‘Jim Crow’ at Brown tonight
Author and civil rights attorney Michelle Alexander will be giving a lecture at Brown University tonight at 6 p.m. in the Martinos Auditorium on her new book. The book, “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Color Blindness,” is about the disproportionately high number of young black people who turn to crime [...]
Occupy’s Rocky Road
Over at Salon, Arun Gupta has a long discussion of all the various strains on Occupy Wall Street; lack of authority/legitimacy from the General Assemblies, the presence of the homeless and finally the presence of so-called “violence advocates” or black bloc protestors. All of these happen(ed) in the microcosm of Occupy Providence, and all present [...]
Darth Flanders at Follies: ‘Lord of the Pink Slip’
The Follies are designed to be funny and irreverent, and this year’s mystery guest was both. Bob Flanders, dressed as an executioner, poked fun at his role as receiver for Central Falls by comparing himself to Darth Vader and calling himself the “lord of the pink slip.” He sang a parody of “Imagine” (as John [...]
Conley’s Pier Sold
PBN reported last week on the sale of Conley’s Pier along Allens Avenue. Under Cicilline, the city had sought to rezone the hospital adjacent section of Allens Avenue to mixed-use, to allow developments like the one pictured with plans for a hotel, office building, private marina, cruise ship terminal, retail, a floating restaurant, and public [...]
Proposal to tax the richest Rhode Islanders
As Rhode Island struggles to pull itself out of the recession many have been asked to sacrifice. Cities and towns have seen drastic cuts in state aid, schools have had their budgets cut, the poor have endured program cuts and public sector employees have had their benefits slashed. Now it’s time to ask Rhode Island’s [...]
Looking beyond the primary system
Do you understand why we nominate presidents the way we do? As we get into the nominating contest, and the Democratic and Republican Parties decrease in popularity (helped along by a bad economy and their own hostile natures), more and more people across the political spectrum advocate for the end of the party system. Most [...]
The new owner/editor of Rhode Island’s Future
Fresh off a redesign of our site, Rhode Island’s Future has a new owner/editor now, too. It’s me! Some of you may know me from my stint as the digital reporter/blogger for WPRO. I know it isn’t the most common career path to go from a right-leaning radio station to leftist-trumpeting website, so allow me [...]
Budgeting for Disaster – Part I
One of the problems of political journalism is trying to parse the difference between what’s really going on and what is said about it. Press releases are misleading as often as they are informative, and interviews seldom get at any matters beyond the superficial. That’s the secret pleasure behind budget analysis. A budget document is [...]
MERI testifies at Board of Elections Hearings about Voter ID
Rhode Island’s controversial new voter identification law goes into effect with this year’s election, and MERI has been actively working to make the process less challenging to our community, particularly transgendered individuals who could face unnecessary hinderances and potential disenfranchisement. This afternoon, MERI appeared in front of the Rhode Island Board of Elections and presented [...]
Dr. Supply-Side, or: How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Stimulus
Some people — including a Presidential front-runner and many leading Democrats in the RI General Assembly — love to insist that government spending does not create jobs, and that therefore we should continue cutting taxes for the wealthy in order to generate economic growth. The problem with the trickle-down argument, other than the fact that there [...]
Been there, done that–part 3 (and final)
One problem that we face here is that this is blog post; it’s not a history book. As such, a certain amount of compression is necessary, and whenever compression occurs, distortion creeps in. There is simply no way around that, save greater length. But greater length leaves more nits behind that can be picked. Some [...]
College costs, debt an issue for Occupy URI
“Pretty much my only option at this point is to die in debt or win the lottery,” said URI communications major Jeff Blanchette at an Occupy URI “teach-in” on Thursday afternoon in White Hall. He was one of two students in the classroom that will owe more than $30,000 in student debt by the time [...]
![Rhode Island One of the Least Corrupt States [Updated]](http://www.rifuture.org/wp-content/uploads/RI-State-House-5-150x150.jpg)
Rhode Island One of the Least Corrupt States [Updated]
A couple days ago, Daniel Lawlor pulled out the old saw of Rhode Island’s corrupt politics, telling us “political corruption is nothing new to Rhode Island.” While Mr. Lawlor’s article is nothing more than really a brief political history of the state, hardly more objectionable then telling us that some folks don’t wash their hands [...]
135 Want to Go to Presidential Convention
More than 130 Rhode Islanders filed with Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis to run for delegate in the state’s April 24 presidential primary. Among the prominent names are Joe Paolino, Myrth York and Ray Rickman as Barack Obama delegates and Don Carcieri, Scott Avedisian and Alan Fung as Mitt Romney delegates. All 135 candidates [...]
New Comments