Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Early in February, the faculty of Connecticut’s four state universities – Connecticut Central State University (CCSU), Eastern Connecticut State University (ECSU), Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU) and Western Connecticut State University (WCSU) – wrote a letter to the relevant chairs and co-chairs of the General Assembly’s education committees critical of Gregory Gray’s attempt by pedagogical fiat to “change the way we teach and deliver education to our students.” Mr. Gray is the President of Connecticut’s State University system. “Many education pundits,” the educators wrote, “now suggest the teacher is no longer the center of learning, and that students learn more from one another than from the faculty. . .this re-alignment means faculty must become ‘facilitators’ of learning. It's imperative that WE. . .[change] our pedagogical approach immediately.”

Shortly after Governor Dannel Malloy nominated his chief counsel Andrew McDonald to Connecticut’s Supreme Court, the Day of New London noted that it was “a testament of how far Connecticut has come that the least controversial fact about Andrew J. McDonald, nominated by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy on Thursday to join the state Supreme Court, is that he is openly gay.” When Mr. Malloy announced awhile back that his administration was the gayest in Connecticut history, no one bated an eyelash. Mr. McDonald was married to Charles Gray in 2009 by then Mayor of Stamford Malloy ; under Secretary for Criminal Justice Policy and Planning Michael Lawlor, the author of the problem ridden Earned Risk Reduction Credits program , is also openly gay.

Kevin Rennie, a Hartford Courant columnist, writes on his blog “ Daily Ructions ”  that Charles Gray, the “spouse of Governor Dannel P. Malloy’s legal counsel and former Pullman & Comley lawyer Andrew McDonald,” might expect a few questions concerning “the details of his relationship with Pullman & Comley,   when he appears before the Executive and Legislative Nominations Committee on Thursday at noon to his nomination to the CAA [Connecticut Airport Authority].” According to Mr. Rennie: “Pullman & Comley had more than a good friend in the room when the Connecticut Airport Authority rejected considerably lower bids from two other firms and hired the Bridgeport-based law firm to serve as its counsel. It had a former client in authority member Charles Gray, spouse of Governor Dannel P. Malloy’s legal counsel and former Pullman & Comley lawyer Andrew McDonald.”