Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

LAME DUCK MALLOY LARDS PORKY BOND AGENDA :  STATE OF ANGER: GOVERNOR'S RACE GETS PERSONAL ” the banner headlines on Tom Dudchik’s  “Capitol Report” read, in screaming text. “Capitol Report” is an aggregator site much frequented by Connecticut politicians and state political watchers that retails important stories. The lede to the featured Hartford Courant story read, “The state Bond Commission will meet Thursday to vote on borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars to finance projects around the state, and the potential for a bonanza of funding for Hartford.”

Some time ago, Republican leader in the State House Themis Klarides reminded a reporter that she was Greek. Her first name, she said, meant “justice.” That was almost right. Themis was an ancient Greek Titaness, the “lady of good counsel,” a personification of divine order, fairness, law, natural law and custom. The name Themis literally means “that which is put in place.” The symbols by which Themis is known are the scales of justice, tools in the ontological order that assure balance. Balance is the baseline in the Greek cosmos according to which right order is measured. To know whether a thing is right and just – morally, legally, ethically, religiously, secularly, atheistically -- one must have more than a nodding acquaintance with reality. Idle dreaming is a fatal threat to right order. Political visions – modern politics is consumed with visions the ancient Greeks might have considered nightmares – are justifiable and practical only when they take into account the rea...

The news was leaked in advance of the formal announcement. Capitol Report, Tom Dudchik’s popular Connecticut aggregation site, announced in a bold red headline -- BOSTON GLOBE: GE MOVING TO BOSTON, BOMBSHELL: GE EXEC CALL BAKER, WALSH . And several sub stories were listed: FLASHBACK: Looney: 'I think they doth protest too much'... FLASHBACK: Sharkey accuses GE of 'fear-mongering'... FLASHBACK: Aresimowicz tells GE suits 'take a weekend off from the yacht'...

According to a headline on Capitol Report pointing to a story in CTMirror , “Malloy Basks,” Governor Dannel Malloy, two days before the Fourth of July, was basking in the glow of his endorsement by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). When you want a service in the private market place, you buy it. The same holds true in the political market place: When you want the support of a powerful public employees union such as SEIU, you buy it with the prevailing coin of the realm, political favors. Political favors go a long way in politics . In return for political stroking – Mr. Malloy earlier had facilitated the unionization of day-care workers and personal-care attendants for persons with disabilities through an executive order – SEIU turned the floodlight on Mr. Malloy.