Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Milton Friedman once said, “If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in five years there’d be a shortage of sand.” If you put socialists in charge of countries, you soon will create shortages of toilet paper, which is the case in Venezuela, reduced to rubble by Hugo Chavez and his successor Nicolás Maduro. No one was surprised last week when Bloomberg announced that rich Venezuelans are fleeing the country – now an economic desert – for more profitable ventures elsewhere: “ Wealthy Venezuelans Are Seeking Haven in Madrid. " Something similar is happening in Connecticut. Tax money “invested” by Governor Dannel Malloy in Connecticut businesses is not working to create a welcoming business environment. “Once again, a Connecticut company making a major investment in its digital business has been lured by another state offering tax breaks and the chance to succeed in a big city,” the Hartford Courant tells us. This time it’s United Technologies (UTC)...

The Republican plan to abolish and replace Obamacare has now collapsed. After much huffing and puffing, Republicans pulled their replacement plan, such as it was, shook the dirt of medical care reform from their feet, and vowed to move on to the next big issue -- tax reform. One imagines U.S. Representative Rosa DeLauro, who made some frantically intemperate remarks in the House before the Republican replacement plane crashed and burned, was delighted. U. S. Senator Elizabeth Warren, move over: Mrs. DeLauro has now become the chief progressive maenad of the U.S. Congress. She brought to her performance suitable demagogic props, a large sign that said “Get Old People,” the words arranged horizontally and the first letter of each word – G-O-P – in fierce bold script. C-Span captured the historic moment here. Mrs. DeLauro was not wearing her pussy hat at the time; so the members of the House were spared that indignity.

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics” – a remark attributed by Mark Twain to Disraeli Len Suzio lost his seat to incumbent State Senator Dante Bartolomeo in a hard fought contest in 2014 by 1% of the vote and won the seat back in 2016 by 2.8 % of the vote.  His is a particularly difficult seat for Republicans; registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans in the 13th District roughly by a two to one margin. Think of Sisyphus rolling his stone up a perilously steep incline.

U.S. Senator Dick Blumenthal was mentioned early in March in connection with the nomination to the Supreme Court of Judge Neil Gorsuch, described by The Hill , not a far right publication, as “a conservative judge who has attracted praise from both sides of the aisle.” Gorsuch, if his nomination passes muster with the U.S. Congress, will be replacing Justice Antonin Scalia, widely regarded as a conservative member of the court. Should Democrats fail to oppose Gorsuch with the proper vigor, progressives warn they will turn their big guns on them.

“First Five” agreements between Governor Dannel Malloy and preferred companies such as Alexion Pharmaceuticals Inc., thought to be a “ major player in Connecticut's fledgling bioscience industry ,” are non-enforced whenever Mr. Malloy chooses not to enforce paper tiger contracts. About a year ago, Alexion moved from Cheshire into its new headquarters in New Haven, the 23 mile move having been facilitated by the usual “First Five” contractual agreement. The package delivered to Alexion’s doorstep by a grateful governor included a $6 million grant, a subsidized $20 million loan transformed into a gift provided Alexion had 650 workers in Connecticut by 2017, and tax credits worth in the neighborhood of $25 million.

Keith Phaneuf of CTMirror, who rather enjoys letting cats out of bags,  remarks in a recent column  that Governor Dannel Malloy will have some leverage in his negotiations with unions next time around. These negotiations materially affect state budgets. While it is true that the governor’s constitutional responsibility ends with his presentation of his budgets to the General Assembly, the Democrat dominated body has been anxious in the past to satisfy its constituency, the most politically active part of which is state employee union members. In the past, the strife between Mr. Malloy and  SEBAC, the union conglomerate authorized to make deals with the governor – but not, significantly, with Republican legislators constitutionally charged with writing and balancing budgets-- has been something of a kabuki theater, featuring fierce, masked players swinging wildly at each other with paper swords. After the governor presents his budget to legislators, the budget o...

In most fairy tales, the way out of the dark forest is the way in -- in reverse. Sometimes the hero of the story will take care when entering the bewildering forest to lay out the way back by leaving behind markers, beans strewn on the ground, so he will not forget the entrance and exit routes. The moral of all these tales is the same: if you’ve make a mistake, reverse your errors. It is a lesson politicians in Connecticut might take to heart. With a little courage and the virtue of foresight, the lucidity of remembrance brought to bear on current difficulties, there is no difficulty that cannot be overcome. In a recent piece in National Review , senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute Stephen Eide gives us a summary view of Connecticut’s weaknesses. The top marginal income-tax rate in Connecticut now stands at 6.99 percent, Eide writes, “almost two points higher than the 5.1 percent in neighboring Massachusetts. The income tax has generated a flood of new revenues — $126 bill...

U.S. Senator Dick Blumenthal has not told us in his wanderings within Connecticut whether he believes the general run of citizens in his state feel safer or less safe with the presence in Connecticut of sanctuary cities. There are, at last count, three sanctuary cities in Connecticut: Hartford, New Haven and Willimantic. However, some state politicians have grand aspirations. State Representative Edwin Vargas of Hartford  put forward last January proposed bill 6709 ,   which would “amend state statutes to prevent the state police from demanding information concerning citizenship from individuals with whom they interact," in effect making the whole of Connecticut a sanctuary state, according to a story in the Hartford Courant .  And indeed, why not? If sanctuary is good for the people of Hartford, New Haven and Willimantic, how can it possibly be bad for the people of New Canaan? The term “sanctuary city” has fallen into disuse lately. As is usual in politics, the t...

The address below was given at Meriden’s Fourth Annual Lincoln Day Dinner The day is named after Abe Lincoln, and well named too. I suppose this year those attending these remarks will thank God – who else? – that they are not called upon to celebrate the Jefferson, Jackson Bailey Dinner, which used to be a day of feasting and merriment for Connecticut Democrats. This was before conscience stricken Democrats re-named their annual event. They did so because Democrats decided, three quarters of a century after President Jackson died, that he had owned slaves – who knew? -- and was not kind to American Indians. Though somewhat debased, Jackson, revered as a populist, is still regarded as the founder of the modern Democratic Party. Lincoln owned no slaves and, in fact, prosecuted a bloody Civil War to emancipate them. He had a wicked sense of humor, unlike the stern, forbidding, disputatious and humorless Andy Jackson. On one occasion, in the midst of a speech, a heckler in the aud...

In Connecticut, some illegal aliens – an illegal alien being a non-citizen who has illegally entered the country and therefore is not, according to national and state laws, a lawful immigrant – commit crimes and remain un-deported. Such was the case with Jean Jacques, a Haitian who entered the country illegally and later was arrested and convicted of attempted murder. Jacques spent seventeen years in Connecticut prisons and was supposed to be remanded on release to ICE, so that he might be deported. The deportation never occurred for reasons that remain fuzzy. On his release from prison, Jacques murdered a young girl, Casey Chadwick, stabbing her to death fifteen times and depositing her body in a closet where she was discovered by her boyfriend. As of this date, we do not know how Jacques was permitted to fall between the cracks. ICE claims that Haiti disputed Jacques’ citizenship or did not have available the paperwork necessary to show that he was a Haitian citizen. C...

If you can hold the line on taxes, you will have created an impetus within the laggard General Assembly for real, long-term cuts in spending, and it is spending, not insufficient revenues, that is driving state debt. The pantry at the Yankee Institute is full of ideas for permanent spending reductions , none of them palatable to progressive Democrats in the General Assembly. To no one’s surprise, rational cuts in spending will upset the status quo apple cart. Most people in Connecticut might be surprised at some of the commuters riding in the cart. Progressives, of course, have their tickets punched, so they think, for the next fifty years. The central tenet of Connecticut progressives in the General Assembly, nearly all of them tied to the iron and inflexible apron strings of the state’s employee unions, is that government is good and more government is better; in order to finance this greater good, additional taxes will be necessary. That has been the operative principle am...