Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

The unilateral changes in by-laws  It may be noted that what has been done unilaterally by the union leadership may be undone unilaterally by a different leadership. Despite a desperate attempt by SEBAC negotiators Dan Livingston and Matt O’Connor to pin on such convenient scapegoats as the Yankee Institute   their dramatic failure to sell plan A to union rank and file members, some unions, dissatisfied with SEBAC representation, are now shopping around for other unions with which they might affiliate. In mid-June SEBAC leaders charged the Yankee Institute had improperly used the state’s e-mail system to communicate with union members and referred their dark suspicions to Attorney General George Jepsen, Connecticut’s version, under the state’s previous Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, of poet Francis Thompson’s “ The Hound Of Heaven .” SEBAC leaders, working in tandem with Plan A salesmen in the administration of Governor Dannel Malloy, unilaterally changed union by-...

Governor Malloy’s “shared sacrifice” was never evenly – some might say “fairly” -- distributed. Progressive Democrats, in fact, do not believe in shared sacrifice. Their credo includes, on the tax side, a progressive income tax in which the “rich,” defined as anyone making more than $200,000 per year, pay the lion’s share of governmental “investments.” SEBAC negotiator Dan Livingston is typical of the genus. In a progressive regime, the majority of people “invest” relatively little in their government and prudently vote for Democrats, who collect little from them in tax payments (AKA “investments”) while showering them with benefits. Whatever name one chooses to put to this lopsided getting and spending process, it is not “shared sacrifice.” Nationally, the wealthiest 1 percent of the population earns 19 percent of all income and pays 37 percent of the federal income tax , a figure that excludes payroll taxes for Social Security and Medicare. The top ten percent pay 68 percent of ...

One of the chief negotiators for SEBAC, the state union coalition negotiating with the administration of Governor Dannel Malloy on union contracts, Daniel Livingston, has written a letter to Attorney General George Jepsen – at one point, early in his career, a lawyer who represented unions – demanding that the attorney general “…investigate and take all appropriate actions authorized by state law” against Yankee Institute investigative reporter Zach Janowski. Mr. Janowski, Mr. Livingston wrote in his letter, “purports to be an ‘investigative reporter’ and… also publishes a blog under the name of ‘Raising Hale.’” Mr. Jepsen, however, is not asked in Mr. Livingston’s letter to investigate Mr. Janowski credentials as an “investigative reporter.” This snarky little tidbit is thrown in perhaps to degrade Mr. Janowski who, Mr. Livingston insists in his letter to Mr., Jepsen, has “degraded state workers.” Mr. Jepsen is not asked in Mr. Livingston’s fanciful and intemperate letter to inves...

The very first item in the secret negotiations between unions and the state regarding union concessions was, according to a report filed by Christine Stuart at CTNewsJunkie , one of the few WORKING journalists in the state -- how best to keep the negotiations secret, not the happiest opening for Connecticut’s new age of governmental transparency. Negotiating for the governor will be Deputy Budget Director Mark Ojakian; negotiating for the State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition will be Dan Livingston, the chief negotiator of SEBAC. Governor Dannel Malloy is expected to enter at the end of the months long negotiations with an aspergillum and bless the end product.

A sharp political analyst, Karl Marx -- who, appropriately enough, wrote for the New York Tribune -- used to talk about “the correlation of forces.” Marx was a lousy economist but a keen observer of people, countries, events and political movements. By the correlation of forces, Marx meant all the important powers that shape politics, the plow that forms the furrow in which politics flows and determines its course. The correlation of forces drifted to the top of my mind about two weeks ago when Gov. Jodi Rell surprised all of us by pulling a pin from her grenade and fragging the Democrat controlled legislature. The ensuing fireworks have been instructive. All the usual suspects retreated behind all the usual barricades. Roy Occhiogrosso, who has become the unofficial voice of the Democrat Party in the media, characterized Rell’s budget, on the Shelly Sindland show, as “a fairy tale.” Republican Party Chairman Chris Healy was sitting beside him, and for once his wits failed him. He migh...

On Friday, Feb 6, hours after Governor Jodi Rell had laid out her budget proposal urbi et orbi, Daniel Livingston, an attorney for the State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition, professed that unions were disappointed in the governor’s no tax budget. Livingston told the Hartford Courant , “The direction she is pushing the budget (sic), we believe, is irresponsible. It’s an anti-stimulus package. It’s the traditional Republican playbook. It’s not the time for the same old, same old. It’s going to make the economy worse.” The unions also wrote a “Dear Jodi” letter to the governor in which they said, “It is time to say openly and frankly to the people of this state that revenue enhancements [union verbiage for tax increases] should be raised in order to close the budget gap and preserve public services.” No one who has been watching the news should be surprised at these entrenchments. Unions have issued previous communications of the same sort, one of them just before Rell’s address in ...

He is a man of splendid abilities, but utterly corrupt. He shines and stinks like rotten mackerel by moonlight -- Senator John Randolph of Virginia, commenting on fellow lawmaker Edward Livingston. In a follow-up to its explosive story on Countrywide, the nation’s now defunct largest mortgage lender whose president Angelo Mozilo had greased the palms of shakers and movers in Congress such as U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd, the chairman of the senate’s powerful banking committee, Portfolio , a Conte Nast publication, now gives us the honorable Richard Aldrich, a California state appeals court justice. As was the case with Dodd, Aldrich also was favored by Mozilo’s chief agent, loan officer Robert Feinberg, who was put in charge of the now notorious “Friends of Angelo” VIP program. Refinancing his 8,200-square-foot house adjacent to a Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course at the Sherwood Country Club in Westlake Village, Aldrich turned to fellow member Mozilo, who through Feinberg approved the $1 m...