Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Wee, sleeket, cowran, tim’rous beastie,  O, what a panic’s in thy breastie! – “To A Mouse,” Robert Burns Democrats, it should be obvious from the numbers, have been losing their grip for a while. The State Senate is now split evenly between Democrats and Republicans, 18-18; in the State House, Republicans now are four seats away from a tie. It was the lack of an edge in the Senate that provided a crack through which Republicans were able to pass their budget through the chamber, three moderate Democrats – Paul Doyle of Wethersfield, Gayle Slossberg of Milford and Joan Hartley of Waterbury – voting with Republicans against a status quo Democratic getting and spending plan. The Democrats, in their own plan, got too much, spent too much, as always, and were inattentive to the signs of the times.

Hartford Courant columnist Kevin Rennie , whose nose is extremely sensitive, smells something fishy in the relationship between former eight-term state Sen. Thomas Gaffey and state Senate President Donald Williams. After recently running for re-election to his seat and winning, Mr. Gaffey quit the senate when he was convicted of having used his own PAC funds to pay for trips that he also billed to the state over several years. It appears the double billing may have been occasioned by Mr. Gaffey’s fondness for a fetching lady. A second girlfriend, Mr. Rennie reported, also tapped into Mr. Gaffey’s affections: “Connecticut State University System Associate Vice Chancellor for Government Relations and Communication Jill Ferraiolo employed her charms to make Gaffey the chief and relentless advocate for a $1 billion blank check in public funds for CSU to spend on construction at its four campuses.” Far from recoiling in horror at Mr. Gaffey’s indiscreet petty larceny, his influential ...

According to a story in the Waterbury Republican American by Martin Begnal , the Democrats may have produced their first Jean D’Arc. Joan Hartley is feeling the whips and scorns of the Democrat Party leadership. Said Hartman, “"They told me I had to support this, and if I didn't then the benefits of the caucus wouldn't be available to me, and I would lose my committee chair, my office and my parking space." “This” is the porcine Democrat bonding plan vetoed by Gov. Jodi Rell. Hartley is the lone hold-out preventing an over-ride of the governor’s veto. And Keith M. Phaneuf of the Journal Inquirer, as usual, gets it right and calls things by their right names. “Connecticut, which has more than $14.3 billion in bonded debt,” Phaneuf notes, “is one of the most indebted states, per capita, in the nation. And annual payments on that debt are consuming an increasingly large share of the state budget. This fiscal year's debt service is expected to top $1.83 billion, or 1...