When Hillary Clinton was struggling to win the Democrat party nomination against upstart Bernie Sanders, she co-opted his idea of free college tuition for all. To appease Sanders supporters, she allowed the idea to become part of the Democrat Party platform on which she is now running. If she really attempts to promote this idea, it will be a disaster for higher education in the country. Connecticut with its longstanding private school tradition will be especially hard hit.
Free tuition would be a disaster for private colleges
Posted inPolitics
As ACA faces new challenges, fixes not assured
WASHINGTON — The Affordable Care Act is facing more challenges than at any time since its initial enrollment period in 2013, when the program was bedeviled by technical glitches. Besides rising premiums and fewer choices in Connecticut and elsewhere, there’s uncertainty a new Congress and a new administration will make fixes to the ACA that will improve its health.
Posted inHealth
Drug prices, not the health law, top voters’ 2017 health priorities
The monthly October tracking poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation finds that issues relating to prescription drug prices and out-of-pocket spending far outrank proposals to address the shortcomings of the Affordable Care Act.
Posted inPolitics
Union dumps consultant, PAC treasurer in Petit ad fiasco
House Majority Leader Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, told reporters Thursday morning that someone should lose their job over the digital attack ad a union political action committee placed against Dr. William Petit. By nightfall, someone did.
Posted inEnergy & Environment, Politics
Katie Dykes, state’s energy policy strategist, to join PURA
Katie Dykes, a key voice on energy policy as a deputy commissioner at the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, was nominated Thursday by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy to serve as a commissioner of the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority.
Posted inCT Viewpoints
Politics in 2016: The unthinkable can happen here
On Oct. 27, 1936, Connecticut theater-goers watched It Can’t Happen Here, performed by the Federal Theater Project, one of the New Deal’s progressive jobs programs. The Nobel prize winner Sinclair Lewis had refashioned his dystopian novel into a dramatic play. It premiered simultaneously in 21 cities across the country, including Hartford and Bridgeport. Americans in the 1930s were being groomed to accept fascism as a macho solution to the troubles faced by the United States. Lewis’s It Can’t Happen Here was a roadblock to that disturbing movement.
Posted inPolitics
Wal-Mart, Koch indirect funders of ads targeting CT Democrats
Grow Connecticut, a Super PAC indirectly funded by Sheldon G. Adelson, Wal-Mart, Koch Industries and other major corporate and conservative donors, is targeting state legislative races in Connecticut with a mix of television and digital ads boosting Republicans and attacking Democrats.
Posted inEducation
Feds: CT students making no progress on science test scores
Connecticut, which used to rank among the best states in science scores, has fallen to the middle of the pack as other states have improved.
Posted inPolitics
Union ad tying Petit to Trump’s ‘attack on women’ backfires
PLAINVILLE — A union Super PAC trying to help re-elect Democratic state legislators by mocking Donald J. Trump’s insensitivity to women scrambled Wednesday to defend its digital attack ad against Dr. William Petit, a home-invasion survivor who raises money for women’s groups in the memory of his murdered wife and daughters.
Posted inPolitics
In CT, most Republican mega-donors steer clear of Trump
WASHINGTON — With the notable exception of Linda McMahon, Connecticut’s Republican mega-donors have largely steered clear of helping their party’s standard bearer – Donald J. Trump. Instead, some of Connecticut’s richest Republicans gave to other candidates running in the GOP primaries and even to the anti-Trump Our Principles PAC.
Posted inCT Viewpoints
The legal community coming together to increase diversity
Recent events and the rhetoric of this year’s presidential campaign have put a sharp focus on the need to devote more energy to the issues of diversity and inclusion and combating implicit bias. The urgent need to face these challenges first grabbed me in the aftermath of the shooting in 2012 at the Sandy Hook School located in my hometown. That event dramatically changed my outlook on life and led me to devote more of my personal time working in and learning about some of our most disadvantaged communities.
Posted inCT Viewpoints
Providing new teaching pathways — one way to improve public schools
Judge Thomas Moukawsher’s recent ruling on education is creating an opportunity to improve our approach to K-12 education in Connecticut. As we set goals for our students, and how to best reach those goals, we must also take time to consider our teachers. Teachers matter more to student achievement than any other factor in a student’s schooling. It is my hope that lawmakers think about how we can increase the number of local teachers who are passionate about learning as well as excited and prepared to support the needs of our students.
Posted inPolitics
CT GOP helps Trump mega-donors bypass campaign limits, legally
Some eye-popping numbers are listed in the Connecticut Republican Party’s latest finance report: On a single day, nearly $900,000 flowed from across the U.S. into its account, nearly doubling its receipts. But the money bounced to the Republican National Committee, a legal trick practiced by both parties to help megadonors evade contribution limits.
Posted inHealth
Feds find doctor lists for Medicare Advantage plans often wrong
Provider directories for private Medicare Advantage plans are riddled with errors, according to the government’s first in-depth review.
Posted inEducation
Grading teachers: Tempers flare over use of student test scores
Should the state require using student test scores to evaluate teachers? Officials have delayed answering that question for years.