Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

When he last ran for the U.S. Senate, Dick Blumenthal, fresh from a two decade stint as Connecticut’s Attorney General, was facing a deep pockets opponent in World Wrestling Entertainment’s former CEO Linda McMahon. It was generally supposed by the fortune tellers in the media that Mr. Blumenthal would easily defeat Mrs. McMahon without breaking sweat – and so he did. Mr. Blumenthal’s current re-election bid features a reversal of fortune, pun intended. Mr. Blumenthal is himself a multi-millionaire, the eighth richest member of Congress, according to a list of multi-millionaires compiled by Roll Call . Of the top ten richest members of Congress, only three are Republicans.

Wussiness is a matter of perspective. If Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, Bill Clinton’s choice for president, has thus far appeared to be a tad less wussy than the other empty wallets with whom she has shared the stage during the Democrat primaries, it is because Hillary’s position on the Iraq war has been more attentive to consequences than, say, that of Sen. Chris Dodd. Dodd’s position on the war is: Run away. No ambiguity there. More precisely, Dodd’s ambition is to do everything legislatively to force the president to withdraw from Iraq – short of passing a bill definancing the war, which would create a multitude of problems for his comrades in the Senate and House. That kind of a bill would be a) constitutional, b) effective in ending the war and c) politically disastrous for the future of the Democrat Party. Dodd, an old anti-Vietnam war protestor, knows that the American public was loathed to turn against that lost cause until very late in the season. Generally, Americans do...