Author Archives: cxpowell

By Chris Powell Wanting to be pious, people like to say that a financial value can’t be set on human life. But of course society calculates such value all the time. Government does it when appropriating for medical care and public safety. Insurance companies and their customers do it when writing and purchasing policies. LawyersContinue reading “Paralyzed man’s case is terrible and yet not really an outrage”

By Chris Powell With a protest march on campus the other day, students at Central Connecticut State University in New Britain showed the world that they haven’t learned what even kids in elementary school might be expected to know. The students demanded that the university administration investigate a fellow student’s complaint of sexual assault thatContinue reading “Reporting rape claim to police should have preceded protest”

By Chris Powell Holy cow! A few people in Connecticut are starting to notice the long failure of social policy and, more remarkably, finding the courage to discuss it. The revelation came in a recent report by investigative reporter Bill Cummings of Connecticut’s Hearst newspapers quoting some worthies in the Bridgeport area. Cummings wrote thatContinue reading “Bridgeport dimly sees reality; and a new golden parachute?”

By Chris Powell Maybe that assistant principal in Greenwich who was recently caught admitting that he hires only young liberals as teachers, the better to propagandize students into voting Democratic, wasn’t such an outlier. The more recent incident at Southington High School, where an English teacher was caught inflicting political propaganda on students, suggests thatContinue reading “A new indoctrination scandal as schools hate being public”

By Chris Powell Has Connecticut state government been turned around, going from huge deficits to huge surpluses, because of Governor Lamont’s great leadership, as the commercials for his re-election campaign claim? The state has had worse governors but its much improved financial position has little to do with anything state government has done. The improvementContinue reading “State turned nothing around but just refinanced failure”

By Chris Powell Secrecy triumphed again this month in “public” education in Connecticut. First the Connecticut State Colleges and University System refused to make available to the Journal Inquirer the personnel files of three officials who were sued in an employment discrimination case whose settlement recently cost the state $775,000. The newspaper was seeking toContinue reading “Accountability keeps losing to public schooling’s secrecy”

By Chris Powell How righteous Connecticut Attorney General William Tong sounds as he rails against M&T Bank for its defective integration of accounts from People’s United Bank, which M&T acquired in April. Tong also fears that M&T isn’t preserving as many jobs from People’s United as planned. These problems shouldn’t be so surprising. Both banksContinue reading “Tong is too late in bank mess; and no one confronts UConn”

By Chris Powell According to those who supervise Connecticut’s elections, voter fraud is not a problem in the state — or at least not outside Bridgeport, where questions of honesty in elections often arise. Last week the state Elections Enforcement Commission began investigating a complaint that a worker for the campaign of a candidate forContinue reading “Connecticut has voter fraud; and fly illegals to New Haven”

By Chris Powell Ranked-choice voting has an endorsement from Governor Lamont, a Democrat, and an open mind from his Republican challenger, Bob Stefanowski, so it is doubly worth discussing during this election campaign. The ranked-choice idea applies to election contests with three or more candidates, contests that present the risk that the candidate with theContinue reading “Connecticut makes a case for ranked choice in elections”

By Chris Powell If distributing more money was the solution to the state’s serious social problems, Connecticut would have solved them long ago. Instead state government now has another commission, the Commission on Community Gun Violence Intervention and Prevention, which met for the first time last month and is to advise the state Public HealthContinue reading “Gun violence with urban poor shouldn’t be such a mystery”