Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

  Fazio The story in the Hartford    Courant -- Where has CT GOP’s Fazio worked? What to know as governor’s race comes to vote – may be much ado about nothing, to quote Shakespeare.   The governor’s race will “come to a vote” in less than a month and so, from the point of view of loyal opposition, it is well timed. The opposition research folks who are paid for turning over political rocks – always selectively -- probably should be given a raise on this one.   The Courant tells us Ryan Fazio’s professional background includes roles in commodities trading, growth equity, and energy/agriculture sectors, but he has not publicly named the companies he worked for — a fact highlighted by the Hartford Courant as a point of political scrutiny.   All political politicians come from somewhere and, at the end of their political confinement, much too long in many cases, they go somewhere to cash in on their political service.   Republicans generally...

  DeLauro The invitation reads, all in caps: “REP ROSA DELAURO TO SPEAK AT SACRED HEART UNIVERSITY ABOUT BEING CATHOLIC IN CONGRESS.”   An enticing preview of DeLauro’s upcoming remarks was provided by Kimberly Schwartz, the Director of Communications at Sacred Heart University in   Fairfield Connecticut:   “U.S. Representative Rosa DeLauro will address the Sacred Heart University community in a talk titled ‘Being a Catholic Member of Congress in a Changing World.’”   On the matter of abortion, DeLauro’s views are heterodox rather than orthodox. That is to say, DeLauro’s views on abortion are not those professed unchangingly by the Catholic Church roughly from the 1st to the 21 st century. The orthodox view of the Catholic Church on abortion is available to anyone -- Catholic politician or not – who has a finger and access to a computer.   However much the world has changed in the intervening centuries, the orthodox position of the Catholic...

Connecticut's General Assembly, Ritter presiding The matter has not yet been decided in court, but there assuredly will be winners and losers.   The U.S. Federal government, its back put against the wall by a Connecticut law that questions the authority of the federal government to operate in certain Connecticut jurisdictions, has sued Connecticut. The federal government will be arguing that the Connecticut law abridges the rights and duties of the federal government under what has been known as the U.S. Constitution’s “Supremacy Clause.”   The Supremacy Clause (Article VI, Clause 2) establishes that the U.S. constitution, federal laws, and treaties override all state laws that conflict with them. It ensures that all state laws, state courts, and state constitutions must be subordinate to the U.S. Constitution and federal laws and treaties made by the U.S. government.   Article VI, Clause 2 is not at all ambiguous. It reads: “This Constitution, and the Laws of...

Every newspaper and news outlet in Connecticut should be screaming from the rooftops in favor of multiple -- far more than two – debates between Governor Ned Lamont and his Republican challenger Ryan Fazio. Multiple debates between the two would reveal, however imperfectly, the strengths and weaknesses of both candidates.   Debates -- the more, the merrier -- cut across the grain of modern political perceptions. Should Lamont be re-throned for a third term as governor in the absence of serious campaign debates, he may rightly credit an indifferent “business as usual” state media for his uncontested victory. Lamont’s handlers, we know, will be advising him to maintain a low profile and use his dazzling record in office as a blind hiding his imperfections in plain sight. Lamont has so far relied on his millions to purchase anonymity from a variety of sources that over the years have produced an artificially, highly attenuated public persona, the result of choreographed public app...

  Lamont Hartford Courant reporter Livi Stanford writes in a front page story -- CCSU president steps down – “Toro’s resignation follows the scandal-plagued departures of two Connecticut State Colleges and Universities chancellors. Last week, an independent review examining Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system’s response to sexual harassment allegations against former interim Chancellor O. John Maduko found ‘serious failures in how CSCU responded to concerns about sexual harassment and gaps in the Board’s process for selecting the former interim chancellor,’ according to an announcement Board of Regents Interim Chair Ari Santiago sent to the CSCU community.”   Toro is “Central Connecticut State University President Zulma Toro [who] resigned Wednesday following an investigation into a complaint alleging the workplace culture under her leadership was oppressive, bullying and intimidating.”   The reaction to Toro’s resignation is not at all unusual. ...

Mamdani George Bernard Shaw, the wily old Fabian Socialist, once said about patriotism, with a wily old Fabian Socialist sneer, “Patriotism if you must, but please – no parades.” Of course, Shaw knew very well that patriotism is a parade, among other things.   The history of the word “patriot” itself shows some antagonistic stretchmarks. It was used as an insult by British patriots of uppity American anti-British revolutionists during the prospectively successful American Revolution. But, as Americans often do, they assigned a new positive meaning to the word -- and held parades during which, as John Adams tells us in post-revolutionary days, flags were flown, martial arms were displayed, the sky burst into patriotic flames, and everyone went home with smiles on their faces.   The war on the American flag – just a piece of cloth – and patriotism, and Christopher Columbus statues, is a relatively recent phenomenon celebrated by anti-American patriots, though not, Shaw...