The following logic used to work and now fails:
$.getJSON("http://localhost:8080/jboss-as-kitchensink-html5-mobile/rest/members", function(data) {
$("#contacts").empty();
var items = [];
$.each(data, function(key, val)

{ console.log("item: " + key + " " + val.name); items.push("<li><a href='#"+ key + "'>" + val.name +"</a></li>"); }

);
$("#contacts").append(items);
$("#contacts").listview("refresh");
});

-------
as seen in this youtube video and comments
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FstGLMr3W8s&feature=gp-n-y&google_comment_id=z12aft3owojdsrmgl04cengwwrjzznmb5t00k&noredirect=1

---- Using the Chrome Debugger (via CordovaSim, right-click, Dev Tools)
has the following error message:

https://rippleapi.herokuapp.com/xhr_proxy?tinyhippos_apikey=ABC&tinyhippos_…l=http%3A//localhost%3A8080/jboss-as-kitchensink-html5-mobile/rest/members 500 () rippleapi.herokuapp.com/xhr_proxy?tinyhippos_apikey=ABC&tinyhippos_rurl=http%3A//localhost%3A8080/jboss-as-kitchensink-html5-mobile/rest/members:1