Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

A picture, it is often said, is worth a thousand words. In the case of a picture on the front page of a newspaper captioned “After Newtown,” the picture may be worth a thousand dead end arguments. The photo shows parents and children milling in the hallway of Henry Barnard Elementary School in Enfield on the first day of school. A bright yellow banner greets the students: “Welcome Back!” In the foreground of the picture, Kevin Hart, “one of the guards stationed at every Enfield school this year,” stands watch, his hands folded in front of him and a gun strapped to his hip. Mr. Hart is “a retired Hartford police officer hired as a monitor for Henry Barnard.” But for the pistol, he is inconspicuous and would arouse no notice.

The New Haven Register did NOT say in its editorial that U.S. Senator Dick Blumenthal ought not to be raising campaign funds from atop the bodies of 20 slain school children; this would have been irregular and, perhaps worst, impolite. The editorial said that U.S. Representative Chris Murphy and Governor Dannel Malloy were “helping give voice to the victims’ families” in Washington D.C. preceding a vote on a gun regulation bill, necessary efforts on an important issue.