Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

  Somewhere on the route to education reform Governor Dannel Malloy bumped into Connecticut’s fourth branch of government, teachers unions and their affiliates in the General Assembly, among them the powerful Speaker of the state House of Representatives, Chris Donovan. Mr. Donovan, the most progressive Speaker since Irv Stolberg departed the General Assembly and left this veil of tears, leapt into politics from a stint as a union representative, and the marks of the union negotiator are etched into the fabric of his being. Some poor ink stained wretches suspect that the evisceration of Mr. Malloy’s education reforms -- the central pillars of which are frequent teacher evaluations tied to continued employment and teacher salaries tied to student performance – are, at least in part, related to Mr. Donovan’s union affections. On March 27, two intrepid reporters, Christine Stewart of CTNewsJunkie and Brian Lockhart of the Hearst chain of newspapers, set out probe Mr. Don...

According to reporter and blogger Brian Lockhart, Ned Lamont, a declared Democratic candidate for governor, will be in Putnam on Thursday to accept the endorsement of Senate President Donald Williams who, along with Speaker of the House Chris Donovan, presided over a budget negotiation last fiscal year that left the state about a half billion dollars in arrears. Williams issued a statement: “Ned has the experience, vision, and courage to hit the ground running on his first day as Governor. As a successful business owner, he’s got what it takes to bring stable, good-paying jobs back to the Quiet Corner and the rest of the state. And he’s proven he is capable of bringing people together to get the best results for Connecticut families. Ned built a thriving business from the ground up – he’s the one we need to generate economic expansion, create jobs and rebuild Connecticut.”

Liberal journalists don’t quite know how to undermine the candidacy of Peter Schiff, who is running against Sen. Chris Dodd as a Republican, but in time they’ll figure it out. On Dennis House’s “Face the State,” two liberal commentators, Rick Green of the Hartford Courant and Brian Lockhart of the Stamford Advocate tossed Schiff around on their horns for awhile. It was difficult to tell who was having more fun. A libertarian economist, Schiff tends to reserve his fire for autocratic governments that distort private transactions through either unsupportable taxes or regulations or both. In fact, if you have a moment, he would be happy to explain to you that all regulations and business taxes are impositions on wages, because businesses pass along these charges to their customers. An unfettered private market, according to Schiff’s view, distributes goods and services more efficiently and less expensively than over-taxed, over-regulated economies. Schiff prefers consumption taxes to ...