Rhode Island Politics
As West Warwick Rep. Tim Williamson continues to flog the twice-shot casino horse here in Rhode Island, an editorial by Thomas Grey–national field director of the National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling–in today’s ProJo points out that the recent Abramoff scandal occurred because of influence peddling done by Indian casinos. Thus, the unsurprising conclusion is that–in…
First things first: I’m not a big proponent of state-sponsored gambling. I understand it can be fun for the participant, but I think that the revenue generated by gambling proceeds give a false sense of security to our politicians. Have a potential revenue shortfall? Let’s not cut spending, let’s increase gambling! We can argue over…
Representative Bruce Long’s discomfort when the U.S. Senate primary race came up during his East Bay GOP Breakfast introduction of Mayor Steve Laffey spoke volumes. It might go too far to speculate about an underlying fear that a primary will alert Rhode Islanders to the fact that they have erroneously elected a Republican. Whatever the…
Although I smirked at the bit-too-genuine surprise that he expressed regarding the credibility with which Anchor Rising is treated, I left the East Bay GOP Breakfast impressed with Bill Harsch. In constructing his message as he campaigns to become Rhode Island’s attorney general, Harsch has hit upon the core idea that Rhode Islanders need to…
Sometimes I think that writers on social or political matters have an obligation not to participate in the processes or events of which they write. It is much more difficult, for example, to speak ill of a player whom one likes personally, or through whom one wishes to gain advantage. And surely both analysis and…
Edward Achorn offers we sighted Rhode Islanders, today, our periodic fix of motivational disheartenment at the state of our state. None of it’s surprising, including the feeling — at least in this overworked blogger — of desperation to do something to make Rhode Island a better place to live and a more fruitful participant in…
Secretary of State candidate Guillaume de Ramel helps advance a point I began making at the end of last week (h/t RI Future)…I write today to strongly support legislation (2006 H 6718) that will incrementally increase the minimum wage in Rhode Island from $6.75 to $7.40 by January 1, 2007. Your committee members and House…
Possibilites for tax-reform in this session of the Rhode Island legislature appear strangely muddled. On the one hand, Speaker of the House William Murphy named tax-reform as one of the three highest priorities for the 2006 legislative session…Let it be our New Year’s resolution; let it be our sense of duty to every Rhode Islander…
The bill making it more difficult for the government to sell a house out from under its owner without the owner knowing it was re-introduced to the RI House yesterday. Representatives Joseph Almeida (D-Providence), Grace Diaz (D-Providence) and Thomas Slater (D-Providence) introduced House Bill 6704 which, if passed, would make 3 major changes to the…
Rhode Island Attorney General Patrick Lynch is unhappy with the Projo‘s coverage of his office’s March 2005 advisory opinion concerning open forums and school committee meetings. In the opinion, the AG’s office stated that school committee members should not respond to public comments made during school committee open forums because substantive responses, in some circumstances,…
