Category Archives: Uncategorized

By Chris Powell Connecticut doesn’t audit the performance of any of its major and expensive state government policies — not education, not welfare, not urban — but now would be a pretty good time for state government to audit its response to the virus epidemic. For the epidemic has consumed nearly two years of stateContinue reading “Amid more infections than ever, do Connecticut’s epidemic policies work?”

By Chris Powell From Connecticut and Washington last week came more strong signs that higher education isn’t worth the expense to many students. The Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system announced that it had just awarded another $3.6 million to 2,400 community college students to help them cover the cost of attendance, which was definedContinue reading “Devaluing public education has become Connecticut’s policy”

By Chris Powell Poor New Haven. Its police department has been unable to make arrests in 35 of the 45 murders committed in the city in the last two years, a failure rate of 78%. Despite $111 million in federal emergency assistance, New Haven’s school system is running a deficit again, constantly losing teachers toContinue reading “Mask police in New Haven don’t bother with murders”

By Chris Powell For several years now the “woke” Democratic majority in the General Assembly has been striving to erase many criminal convictions, either by statute or by facilitating pardons. This has been done on the mistaken premise that criminal records are the main impediments to former offenders as they seek to regain employment andContinue reading “Pardon puts cop back on beat; and teacher pension inequity”

By Chris Powell Don’t call it a “vaccine passport,” Governor Lamont says. What the state Public Health Department has started providing Connecticut residents is a “digital vaccination card” that uses a state government database to affirm the holder’s inoculation for Covid 19. Everything about it will be voluntary. No one will be required to obtainContinue reading “Local option during epidemic suits election-year politics”

By Chris Powell Revolutionaries throughout history sometimes have adopted a policy of “no enemies on the left,” figuring that, once in power, they could purge (or murder) those in their coalition who were not leftist enough. Maybe that’s how the Connecticut People’s World Committee, part of the state’s Communist Party, and Democratic U.S. Sen. RichardContinue reading “Blumenthal helps celebrate America’s Communist Party”

By Chris Powell Connecticut, the state’s Hearst newspapers found this month in a series of investigative reports, has not made much progress solving its domestic violence problem. Of course studies of the state’s other major problems might reach a similar conclusion, but one has to start somewhere. Connecticut’s main response to domestic violence is theContinue reading “Why Connecticut won’t ever diminish domestic violence”

By Chris Powell Last week New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker got a slap in the face from the city council, the Board of Alders, which rejected his nomination of Acting Police Chief Rene Dominguez to become permanent chief, despite her creditable 20 years with the city’s police department. The board’s complaints against Dominguez were thatContinue reading “Most murders in New Haven are unsolved but who cares?”

By Chris Powell For decades Connecticut’s elected officials have not been very good at solving the state’s major problems, which remain much the same as they long have been. But as shown by the latest report from the Yankee Institute, written by Ken Girardin, assisted by the Reason Institute’s Marc Joffe — “Warning Signs: 2021Continue reading “Connecticut’s pension debts aren’t even close to covered”

By Chris Powell Maybe it won’t be enough if the statue of Major John Mason is removed from its niche above the north steps of Connecticut’s Capitol building. For the other day the Connecticut Post’s Ken Dixon provided a wonderful compendium of the political and moral defects of the other state heroes memorialized with statuesContinue reading “Connecticut may never find perfect heroes for state Capitol”