Previous Jared Paul Podcast episodes:

• Capitalism vs. Juno; Why Warren shouldn’t run; multiparty politics
• MLK as enemy of the state, car on protester violence

We’ve got a special post State of the Union podcast for you today, complete with extended conversations with most of our congressional delegation about President Obama’s speech last night. Unfortunately we weren’t able to catch up with Senator Whitehouse,  but we did speak with Senator Reed and Congressmen Langevin and Cicilline.

Monday Jan 27, 2013
North Kingstown, RI – Happy Monday morning, Ocean State Futurists. This is Bob Plain, editor and publisher of the RI Future blog podcasting to you from The Hideaway on the banks of the Mattatuxet River behind the Shady Lea Mill in North Kingstown, Rhode Island.

Our show today is brought to you by Largess Forestry. Seriously folks … winter is the best time of year to care for trees – so if you’ve got some projects you’ve been putting off, give Matt Largess a call at 849-9191, or friend them on Facebook.

This morning we speak with Jim Vincent executive director of the Providence branch of the NAACP about a press conference his group is hosting today to call attention to the growing sense of fear and frustration in the inner cities. The NAACP and some 12 other community groups will be meeting outside the Garrahy Judicial Complex in Providence today at 4:30 to announce an effort at working together to call attention to these issues….

We’ll also catch up with probably-soon-to-be Woonsocket state Rep. Mike Morin. Morin just won the Democratic primary to fill Lisa Baldelli-Hunt’s old seat in the State House. Assuming he wins the general election Feb 25 – and I think this is a safe assumption given he’s the only name on the ballot – that will mean the Woonsocket House delegation will be 2/3 fire fighters!

It is Thursday, January 24 and before we hear from Jim Vincent and Mike Morin, let’s see what else is going on in the Ocean State…

“Providence, Rhode Island, is the coolest city in New England. I would even put it on the shortlist of coolest small cities in the United States,” writes Pamela Petro in Travel Magazine.

Elizabeth Harrison of RIPR wrote this about cheating on high stakes tests in Rhode Island public schools: “I have heard whispers about changed answers on tests in Rhode Island, but my efforts to get the booklets in question ran into a roadblock. Education officials cited the state’s open records law, saying it does not require test booklets to be made available to the public.”

The New York Times editorial board wrote this about school evaluation systems: “Historically, the rankings compared a school’s test scores with those of the district as a whole. But under that system, demographics ruled the day; wealthy schools invariably were ranked at the top and poor schools at the bottom.”

This was on the front page of the ProJo this morning but Sam Howard also tweeted about it last night: 1 out of 7 Americans use food stamps, the majority of them are of working age and the cost of the program has doubled in the last five years. How’s rampant income inequality working out for you again, America? Because for at least 14 percent of the country it sucks, and everyone else is paying for it.

A former Hasbro employee is suing the company saying she was discriminated against because she is a lesbian. According to the Providence Journal, she was fired for making “a sexually inappropriate comment.” The Department of Labor and Training awarded her full unemployment benefits … and they don’t usually do that if you’ve been fired….

And this just in: Speaker Gordon Fox could buy my house in East Greenwich and probably still have enough money left in his campaign account to run for and win reelection. Large amounts of money in politics, I am coming to believe, is the biggest danger to our democracy. RI Future would like to see the ProJo op/ed page and Ken Block devote the same veracity to this issue that they teamed up for on the master lever. Common Cause RI and Demand Progress are both working on this issue this year too….

Friday Jan 24, 2013
North Kingstown, RI – Good morning, Ocean State Futurists. This is Bob Plain, editor and publisher of the RI Future blog podcasting to you from The Hideaway on the banks of the Mattatuxet River behind the Shady Lea Mill in North Kingstown, Rhode Island.

Later on in the show, we’ll be checking in with we’ll be checking in with Steve Brown of the ACLU on Waivergate, the latest fiasco with the NECAP graduation requirement. We’ll also here from Rep. Dennis Canario, a legislator who represents Sakonnet and parts of Portsmouth, on why he is pushing a bill this session to label genetically modified foods.

Our show today is brought to you by Largess Forestry. Preservationists and licensed arborists, no one will care for your trees better than Matt Largess and his crew. If you’ve got a tree or a woodlot in need of some sprucing up, call Matt today for a free consultation at 849-9191 … or friend them on Facebook.

It is Thursday, January 24 and the unemployment rate is up, but so is our population. And, if you ask me, so is our collective psyche. I can just kinda feel it everywhere I go that Rhode Islanders are feeling better about the biggest little state in the union … And I give major credit to Linc Chafee, the Rhode Island Foundation and all the other folks who work tirelessly to focus on what’s great about Rhode Island and pick us up by our bootstraps. Seriously, if we can break the inferiority complex that the Ocean State has long suffered from, we’ll have done something a lot more important than simply created some wealth and maybe a couple jobs…

There were 400 more unemployed people in Rhode Island in December than the previous month bringing the total number to an almost eerily even 49,900, reports the Providence Journal this morning.  This has become our monthly box score and reporters, politicians and pundits comb through these monthly numbers the way I poured over NBA agit in the ProJo when I was a kid…

Monday Jan 23, 2013
North Kingstown, RI – Good morning, Ocean State Futurists. This is Bob Plain, editor and publisher of the RI Future blog podcasting to you from The Hideaway on the banks of the Mattatuxet River behind the Shady Lea Mill in North Kingstown, Rhode Island.

Today is Thursday, January 23 and our show today is brought to you by Largess Forestry. Woodland preservationists and licensed arborists, no one will care for your trees better than Matt Largess and his crew. If you’ve got a tree or a woodlot in need of some sprucing up, call Matt today for a free consultation at 849-9191. That’s 849-9191 … or friend them on Facebook

A little later on, we’ll be talking to Neil Steinberg, executive director of the Rhode Island Foundation about the next step fort the Make It Happen RI movement … today the group will release a report on how to resurrect Rhode Island’s economy called Economic Intersections of Rhode Island: a private sector generated action agenda.

But first, the news…

Providence Journal columnist Ed Fitzpatrick helps Common Cause bring the gubernatorial candidates to the table to sign a meaningful People’s Pledge that would limit undisclosed, out-of-state money in the campaign. RI Future blogger Sam Howard has been all over this issue too, and he posted his third piece on it yesterday.

Also on RI Future this week, Steve Ahlquist has been running a series on reproductive justice … you should check out the videos he’s been posting as they show this is a broad-based issue that is more about freedom and economic prosperity for women than anything else.

And the AP’s David Klepper reports states all over the country – including Rhode Island – are considering legislation to label GMO foods. We’ve written a lot on this one Futurists, so let’s keep the pressure on … so far, only Maine and Connecticut have passed laws to label genetically modified ingredients.

Rep. Dennis Canario, from Portsmouth, Tiverton, Little Compton, is sponsoring the bill in the House. In a press release he said, “Knowledge is power and people need to know what they are putting into their bodies.” And added, ““I am not interested in launching a fight for an outright ban on genetically engineered products, but I am interested in educated consumers.“

West Warwick — This post-industrial exurb on the Pawtuxet River may no longer be a manufacturing or retail mecca, and it’s tax base could certainly use a few extra dollars, but West Warwick still seems flush with at least one resource necessary for municipal success: a very strong sense of community and people who love the town.

On Sunday, the RIF podcast team (Mark Gray and I) went to Boneheads on Washington Street in the heart of Arctic to talk about the town with three local political leaders – Senator Adam Satchell, Town Councilor David Kenahan and Town Manager Fred Presley. (Disclosure: Gray is Satchell’s campaign manager)

We touched upon how West Warwick went from being one of the biggest manufacturing locales in the world and one of Rhode Island’s premiere shopping districts to being on the verge of bankruptcy, and whether it was exorbitant pensions or steep state cuts that put it there. We also dive deep into the tremendous sense of community that exists among the locals, and some ideas for West Warwick to move forward into the 21st century economy.

Monday Jan 13, 2013
North Kingstown, RI – Good morning, Ocean State. This is Bob Plain, editor and publisher of the RI Future blog podcasting to you from The Hideaway on the banks of the Mattatuxet River behind the Shady Lea Mill in North Kingstown, Rhode Island.

Today is Tuesday, January 14 and our show today is brought to you by Largess Forestry, our first podcast sponsor. Forest preservationists and licensed arborists, no one will care for your trees better than Matt Largess and his crew. If you’ve got a tree or a woodlot in need of some sprucing up, call Matt today for a free consultation at 849-9191.

Rhode Islanders can expect rain and warm weather today, with temperatures getting close to 50 degrees. In other words, it will be easy even for the simple-minded to recognize the planet is warming today. Thanks God, for making it a little harder for the right-wing spin machine to spread lies about the health of our planet…

And speaking of conditions that question our assumptions about the world … General Treasurer Gina Raimondo, it seems, will be running for governor as a progressive. Her campaign logo even looks like RI Future’s!! For royalties, we only request that you pay us a visit here at the Shady Lea Mill and be our guest on the podcast.

Monday Jan 13, 2013
North Kingstown, RI – Good morning, Ocean State. This is Bob Plain, editor and publisher of the RI Future blog podcasting to you from The Hideaway on the banks of the Mattatuxet River behind the Shady Lea Mill in North Kingstown, Rhode Island.

It’s Monday, January 13 … and while last week we wondered if Rhode Island was the only state in the nation to have a governor who surfs, this week we’ll be wondering if we’re the only state to have a gubernatorial hopeful responsible for a traffic fatality.

The Providence Journal reports this morning that in 1989, a 19-year-old Allan Fung, now mayor of Cranston who is running for governor, was arrested for the death of a man after a car accident he caused on Interstate 95. The charges were later dropped. Fung was coming home from college for the weekend and he allegedly lost consciousness, or maybe he fell asleep at the wheel, crossed three lanes of traffic and hit and killed a man who was changing a tire in the breakdown lane.

Wow … what a life-changing event for Mayor Fung. A lot of folks wouldn’t have the courage to enter public service after such an experience. I applaud him for telling this story, and more so for being able to move on from it.

That said, Sam Howard penned an important piece about both Republican candidates for governor late last week … both Fung and Barrington millionaire Ken Block agreed to boycott John DePetro and/or WPRO, but quickly abandoned their commitment as soon as the hateful shock jock’s month in exile was over.

On NBC 10 News Conference this weekend, we debated the merits of legalizing marijuana. Justin Katz, the ostensibly small government libertarian-leaning conservative, said he’s afraid it will lead to a government monopoly over drugs and prostitution. Ironically enough his opposition to marijuana smacks of paranoia.

I can’t believe I actually have opportunity to say this, but the ProJo editorial page has a more nuanced and reasonable reason for opposing legalization this morning. They write the legalization could increase use among kids. Experts don’t necessarily agree.

In December, East Greenwich school drug counselor Bob Houghtaling joined Jared Moffat and Rebecca McGoldrick of Regulate RI here in the RI Future newsroom to talk about just this topic. Houghtaling thinks it will be easier to teach kids how to make healthy choices about pot if we take a less punative approach.

In other news about potentially progressive legislation this year from the State House … Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed said last week that her chamber will focus on addressing poverty this session as a means to fixing Rhode Island’s ailing economy.

And in New Hampshire this week, the talk is about campaign finance reform. Harvard professor and Rootstriker Lawrence Lessig organized, with Demand Progress and Rhode Island’s own David Segal, a two week march through the Granite State to get residents to demand presidential candidates take a stand against money dominating politics.

Friend of RI Future Mike McCarthy is there for the entire two weeks and we hope he’ll be checking in with us on occassion. In the meantime, here’s my interview with McCarthy from Friday … he stopped by the Hideaway to borrow my sleeping bag for his trip. Listen to our conversation about his adventure here.