Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Hell hath no fury, to vary a well-worn phrase, like a Weicker scorned. Vile and ingrate! too late thou shalt repent The base Injustice thou hast done my Love: Yes, thou shalt know, spite of thy past Distress, And all those Ills which thou so long hast mourn'd; Heav'n has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn'd, Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn'd. William Congreve, in The Mourning Bride , 1697 Once again – a bad habit in former Senator and Governor Lowell Weicker’s case – Mr. Weicker has brought his hobnail boot down upon yet another Republican and   former friend, according to a piece in CageSideSeats (CSS) , “ Lowell P. Weicker, Jr. sticks the boots to former friend Linda McMahon .”

The Senator from Central Casting The Rise, Fall and Resurrection of Thomas Dodd By David E. Koskoff Publisher: New American Political Press Price: $29.95/hardcover “ If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country .” E. M. Forster Lacking such scruples, it was the other way around for the close associates of Senator Thomas Dodd, the subject of David Koskoff’s book, appropriately titled, perhaps with a wink in the direction of Mr. Dodd’s son, Chris Dodd, “The Senator from Central Casting: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of Thomas J. Dodd.” There are some important differences between father and son. When Dodd the younger retired from the US Senate, he was almost immediately scooped up by Hollywood as the chief lobbyist for Tinseltown. After Dodd the elder had been censured by the senate for having used public funds for his personal benefit, in addition to having accepted from both the governme...

Both Sen. Chris Dodd and Governor Jodi Rell, two long serving Connecticut politicos, are retiring. Mrs. Rell, who made a name for herself as an ethicist following the collapse of Governor John Rowland’s administration, has been roundly criticized for tapping lobbyists to pay for her send-off, which included a testimonial dinner that raised an estimated $60,000 for an endowment to help establish a public service education center in her name at the University of Hartford. Mr. Dodd is doubtful that departing politicians should be memorialized by having such things as bridges and roads named after them. No bridges please, he told WFSB’s Dennis House on “Face The State.” Of course, if the name is attached to something appropriate, then that would be appropriate. The University of Connecticut named a building housing the Senator Tom Dodd archives after his father. Chris Dodd’s legacy will be christened by a leftist organization, Connecticut Citizens Action Group on Friday, December 10. T...

There has been some jockeying among Republicans in the U.S. Senate race. Sam Caliguiri has shifted his campaign from U.S. Senator to U.S. Rep, which leaves U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd to the tender mercies of the three remaining Republicans in the race: former CEO of World Wide Wrestling Linda McMahon, former U.S. Rep. Rob Simmons and Peter Schiff, a libertarian economist. Former ambassador to Ireland Tom Foley is deciding whether he would rather be governor than senator. On the left side of the Democratic barracks, some progressives are dissatisfied with Dodd, though the senator has move very far to the left to placate them. Dodd’s “good,” however, is not good enough to satisfy unappeasable progressives. There is a palpable anguish in the progressive camp, much of it turning upon the dread suspicion that Dodd, should he remain in the race, will lose his seat to a Republican. The senator’s polling negatives are dangerously low. Therefore, it is being urged by some progressives that Dodd...

What percentage of the Connecticut Congressional delegation is Catholic? Some orthodox Catholics would say zero percent. To turn a phrase, it depends on what you mean by Catholic.” Sen. Chris Dodd is a well known Catholic. At least, he was baptized into the Catholic Church. His immediate family – Sen. Tom Dodd and his mother Grace – were indisputably Catholic. We all were in the early 40s when baby Dodd was received into the Catholic communion. But there is a question mark hanging like a Damoclean sword over Chris Dodd’s head. Being Catholic is similar to but not exactly the same as being a member of the Democrat Party. Catholics have a thing called communion which, in addition to being a sacrament, also points to the unity of the church. In fact the words “unity of the church” are pronounced in the liturgy when the faithful take communion. And if you are not in doctrinal unity with the faith, you ought not to take the sacrament which, in any case, will not be efficacious. Sometimes wh...

The Hartford Courant, assaulted by the paper's columnist and ex-radio talk show host Colin McEnroe as being insufficiently empathetic to Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd, invited Friends of Dodd (FOD) to weigh in on the senator’s sterling virtues. The shade of former Gov. John Rowland, towards whom all the commentators celebrating Dodd’s spotless career in the U.S. Senate were insufficiently empathetic, hovered over the whole enterprise like Banquo’s ghost. McEnroe wrote that the Courant had “engaged in an unattractive feeding frenzy,” displaying “a tabloid-style headline that was so garishly loaded as to constitute a real lapse in journalistic standards.” The “political establishment, with one or two exceptions, has shown itself to be utterly without spine.” They have repaid the kindnesses shown them “by treating him like a pin pulled hand-grenade. They stand 80 yards from the blast site feebly waving.” A lament for Connecticut's beleaguered ex-governor perhaps? Nope. It’s...

" Tom Dodd , who is currently touring Iowa on behalf of his brother, Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd, was a different type of visitor from what the students had previously encountered. He served as U.S. Ambassador to Uruguay from 1997 to 2001 and then as ambassador to Costa Rica until 2005. Last year he authored a third book, "Tiburcio Carias: Portrait of a Honduran Political Leader," about the longest-serving head of the Honduran government. In addition, Tom Dodd serves as adjunct professor in the school of foreign service at Georgetown University and has previously taught at the Escuela de Estudios Superiores in Mexico. "The former ambassador discussed how the life of the younger brother he refers to as "Christy" and his own have often been on parallel tracks, despite a 10-year age difference. "'He went into a life of politics and got interested in Latin America as a Peace Corps volunteer,' Dodd said. 'I went into academic life. But we inter...

The following information, which includes a critical commentary, was taken from Sen. Chris Dodds’ official site . “From his time in the Peace Corps as a young man to his 25 years on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee,” according to the site information, “Chris Dodd has worked to strengthen America through bold engagement.” Dodd joined the Peace Corp. and later the National Guard, some think, to avoid a bold personal engagement in Vietnam. An example of Dodd’s “bold engagement” is provided on the site: “Dodd Was a Leader in Ending U.S. Military Assistance to the Nicaraguan Contras, which Opened the Door for Successful Elections in 1990.” There are two paths in Latin America. Hugo Chavez, the dictator of Venezuela mentioned only in passing on the site referenced, has taken the path more traveled by tyrants on the way up. Having seized the oil industry and crushed opposition newspapers, Chavez is now in the process of consolidating his power. A week ago, he threatened the Catholic Ch...

First Sen. Chris Dodd, now running for president, announced the event on the Don Imus show; then he gave several interviews in Washington DC, the senator’s theatre of operation, where the anti-President George Bush war room is located; then he went on the stump in Iowa and South Carolina where, along with congressional pal Sen. Joe Biden, he called upon the citizens of that great state to remove the confederate flag, now on display within sight of the capital building, to a museum of their choosing, where it belongs; then he went back to base camp in Washington DC to hobble the efforts of the president to raise troop levels in Iraq, though he has not yet demanded that Bush be removed to a museum; and finally – ta’da, a flourish of trumpets please! – the tribunes of the people have reported that Dodd will on Friday, Jan. 18 – mark it on your calendars -- return to his home state to tell the good old boys that he is running for president. A little late, grumbled the Hartford Courant’s ch...

Republican successes are punished unremittingly by partisan Democrats. If one reads just the Connecticut press, and nothing else, one must suppose that U.S. delegate to the United Nations John Bolton was a failure during his short term in the UN. That is not true. As Robert Novak notes in a column on U.S. Senator Chris Dodd and Bolton. And, of course, Dodd supported those who refused to bring to a floor vote Bolton's nomination to the post, congress' way of executing the prisoner and then washing one's hands of the business, the coward's way out. Some responsible journalists, David Lightman of the Hartford Courant among them, continue to refer to Dodd as a senator who rarely opposes presidential nominees. Dodd now has at least two notches on his pistol – representing Reich and Bolton – and one wonders how many more Bush nominees Dodd must successfully run out of Dodge before reporters stop referring to him as one who generally believes that presidents should have the o...

Q: Mr. Schlesinger, do you understand why some people in Connecticut, even some Republicans, regard your candidacy as menacing? They think that a vote for Schlesinger is a vote for Lamont, so that voting for you would be something of a – if you’ll forgive the expression – gamble. A: Very funny. But at least I gambled with my own money. I notice that powerful people in Washington who gamble with the people’s money are not subjected to the same critical analysis. Q: Who would that be? A: Harry Reid, the leader of Democrats in the Senate. Corruption, apparently, is catchy. The Associated Press now is reporting that U.S. Senate Democrat leader Harry Reid has slipped on blood. The anti-corruption pit bull has been using his campaign funds to give Christmas bonuses to the staff at the Ritz Carlton, an upscale condominium where he lives in Washington D.C. That’s the sort of sloppy accounting that that got Sen. Tom Dodd in trouble. This is strike two for Reid, according to the AP. Let me read ...