Joe Markley

In our time and place, nothing lends more authority to a field than calling it a science.  Polling has particularly benefited from the rigor implied by its association with the true science of statistics, and its jargon of sample sizes, margins of error and the like. But faulty data defies the most stringent analysis, and that fact has undermined opinion surveys. 

The founders of our nation not only perceived the challenges to good government in their own day but anticipated the problems most likely to arise.  Their division of government power into three carefully delineated branches created a powerful check on despotism, but –despite the brilliance of their effort– the balance between the branches was never perfect, and the imbalance has worsened with time.

Bait-and-switch is bad enough, but in the case of truck-only tolling, Gov. Ned Lamont isn’t even pretending: he’s telling us right out that he plans to make the switch.  Shame on us if we fall for this scam.

The budget document now headed to the governor’s desk involves much more than the dollars and cents of state spending.  For some years now, both the budget and the bills implementing it contain sections that dictate policy, not expenditures.  It’s a dangerous practice, which effectively forces legislators to approve proposals that wouldn’t pass on their own merits, often without a public hearing or proper scrutiny.

Two hours before dawn on August 22, 1991, a tie vote in the state Senate was broken by Lowell Weicker’s lieutenant governor, whose action guaranteed that a state income tax would be imposed on the people of Connecticut. The spending spree enabled by that infamous vote was the chief cause of our subsequent economic decline.  Since the tax took effect, we rank dead last in economic growth among the 50 states. It matters who breaks ties in the Connecticut Senate.