By CHRIS POWELL At least President Biden has some sense of his high office, knows how to behave in public, and unlike his predecessor, Donald Trump, is not likely to become a cosmic embarrassment on account of his demeanor. No,…
Posted: 25 January 2021 [05:14 PM] Posted: 19 January 2021 [07:33 PM] By CHRIS POWELL As he skips the inauguration of his successor and shuffles off to his resort in Florida, has Donald Trump destroyed the Republican Party? Some political observers think so and of course Democrats hope so. Trump's petulant and…
Posted: 18 January 2021 [08:46 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Last week this column examined the government pension racket in Connecticut through the example of the "retirement" of New Haven Police Chief Tony Reyes, who is only 49 and is giving up his city salary of $170,000…
Posted: 17 January 2021 [09:02 PM] By DANTE TAGARIELLO To the Editor: Just last week, two Democratic state senators from Fairfield County, Sens. Will Haskell (Wilton) and Alex Kasser (Greenwich), have once again proposed a bill to support highway tolling. Both senators have proposed the…
Posted: 17 January 2021 [09:01 PM] THE BRISTOL HISTORICAL SOCIETY To the Editor: The Bristol Historical Society, as other organizations, had to curtail programming and was unable to open during the covid-19 pandemic. This certainly impacted finances and the ability of BHS to raise the revenues…
Posted: 13 January 2021 [08:49 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Everyone agrees that Tony Reyes has been a great police chief in New Haven, having been appointed in March 2019 after nearly two decades of rising through the ranks of the police department. But the city will…
Posted: 11 January 2021 [04:30 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Does any state do more posturing against racism than Connecticut does only to get such meager results? A week ago West Haven's City Council joined the 19 other municipalities in the state that have declared racism a…
Posted: 06 January 2021 [08:46 PM] By CHRIS POWELL When Bob Stefanowski was the Republican nominee for governor two years ago, he was mocked by Democrats for being light on the issues - for advocating repeal of the state income tax without specifying how to reduce…
Posted: 04 January 2021 [09:04 PM] By KATE MCOMBER To the Editor: The arts are essential and they need our help. In March, the City of Hartford asked the Greater Hartford Arts Council to survey a number of local arts organizations about how they were…
Posted: 04 January 2021 [09:02 PM] By ALEX SOKLOW To the Editor: If President Biden agrees to a pact with Iran or North Korea, we must be allowed to inspect suspected sites without a waiting period. If there is a waiting period, they can move…
Posted: 04 January 2021 [09:01 PM] By JACOB SWATHI To the Editor: As our own country struggles with the battle against covid-19, some may have forgotten the global scale of this disease, especially in third-world countries. Due to limited manufacturing and the preorders of wealthy…
Posted: 04 January 2021 [08:55 PM] By CHRIS POWELL After a cowardly absence of nine months, the General Assembly reconvenes this week. Though legislators may not recognize it, the first question facing them is whether their new session is to be one of substance or merely…
MAYOR'S COLUMN: Looking back at 2020 and ahead to 2021 Posted: 03 January 2021 [09:24 PM] By ELLEN ZOPPO-SASSU Last year at this time, it is doubtful any of us would have seen the challenges of 2020 coming…
Posted: 01 January 2021 [08:51 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Employees of Connecticut's largest newspaper, the Hartford Courant, cleaned out their desks the other day as the newspaper left the building at 285 Broad St. where it had operated for 70 years. It was well reported that…
Posted: 31 December 2020 [08:14 PM] It was a year many of us will remember for all the wrong reasons. Never has there been so much change in so little time. The coronavirus took us all by surprise, never realizing how it would affect our lives.…
Posted: 30 December 2020 [08:37 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Many in Connecticut, including most of its news organizations, are gushing about President-elect Joe Biden's choice of state Education Commissioner Miguel Cardona, a Meriden native, to be secretary of the U.S. Education Department. News reports say the…
Posted: 23 December 2020 [08:52 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Frank Capra's 1946 film, "It's a Wonderful Life," to be broadcast again tonight at 8 by NBC television, is loved most for its personal message of discovery at Christmas: that its hero's life has been, unbeknownst to…
Posted: 22 December 2020 [07:43 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Legions of the politically correct are insisting that President-elect Joe Biden's wife, Jill, be given the honorific title "Doctor" because she holds a doctorate degree in education, which she received largely on the basis of a mediocre…
Posted: 21 December 2020 [08:43 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Government in Connecticut is often mediocre but it usually excels at clearing the roads during and after a snowstorm like last week's. Maybe this is because while some failures are easily overlooked or concealed, there is no…
Posted: 20 December 2020 [08:16 PM] By KIM SHINKOSKEY To the Editor: Americans late in 2020 have found our first, if likely our last, common rallying point since 2016. That wonderful place of agreement is priority vaccination of healthcare workers. In this, we all believe.…
Posted: 20 December 2020 [08:15 PM] To the Editor: Nuchie’s Restaurant will be missed. The “Christmas Wishes for Kids” event has been sponsored by the Mid-State Association of Realtors and Nuchies, for more than 25 years, Dave and Mike Pasqualicchio have given their all…
Posted: 20 December 2020 [08:13 PM] By CHRIS POWELL While the master state government employee union contract's ban on layoffs expires next July, no serious changes in personnel management that might favor the public can be expected. There are two reasons for this. First, the remainder…
Posted: 16 December 2020 [06:57 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Back when children attended school in Connecticut, before administration was forfeited to the teacher unions, and the kids had their first lessons about government, they were taught the division of responsibility. That is, the federal government is…
Posted: 14 December 2020 [08:15 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Now that the Democratic majorities in the General Assembly are increasing as a result of last month's election, visions of sugarplums dance again in the heads of those who think that "property tax reform" and spending more…
Posted: 11 December 2020 [08:46 PM] By CHRIS POWELL As was inscribed on the pedestal of the statue of college founder Emil Faber in the movie "Animal House," "Knowledge is good." But knowledge can be overpriced, as the growing clamor about college student loan forgiveness soon…
Posted: 09 December 2020 [08:27 PM] By CHRIS POWELL America's oldest continuously published newspaper is now the country's newest paper without an office of its own. The Hartford Courant announced last week that it is terminating its lease on the building it has occupied…
Posted: 07 December 2020 [09:03 PM] By MARK PARKINSON AND SCOTT TITTLE To the Editor: Dear Governors, Thank you for your leadership in response to this unprecedented health crisis and the action your administrations have undertaken to help nursing homes and assisted living communities protect our…
Posted: 07 December 2020 [09:00 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Having been there, done that, and gotten a T-shirt reading "My Party Abandoned Me," Governor Lamont seems to have given up on imposing tolls on Connecticut highways to fortify the state's transportation infrastructure. But having just increased…
MAYOR'S COLUMN: Snapshots of Bristol as winter approaches Posted: 06 December 2020 [08:02 PM] By ELLEN ZOPPO-SASSU One of the perks of being mayor is having a police radio in the office which scans all channels…
Posted: 06 December 2020 [07:55 PM] By CHRIS POWELL While Governor Lamont remarked the other day that state government doesn't have enough money to rescue every business suffering from the virus epidemic and the curtailment of commerce, most people think the federal government has infinite money…
Posted: 30 November 2020 [08:47 PM] By CHRIS POWELL With Connecticut sure to struggle with the virus epidemic for many more months and state government sinking deeper into the financial disaster caused by the epidemic and government's response to it, it is amazing that the most…
Posted: 27 November 2020 [08:41 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Many people want to get out of Hartford, just as many people already have gotten out, the city having lost a third of its population since 1950. The problem for the people who still want to get…
Posted: 25 November 2020 [08:01 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Amid the growing panic fanned by news organizations about the rebound in the virus epidemic, last week's telling details were largely overlooked. First, most of the recent "virus-associated" deaths in Connecticut again have been those of frail…
Posted: 23 November 2020 [08:11 PM] By TIM GAMACHE To the Editor: The Bristol Veterans Council would like to express our appreciation to those high school student volunteers who assisted with reading the names of Bristol Veterans who passed away in the last year. Without…
Posted: 23 November 2020 [07:59 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Not so long ago censoriousness was a phenomenon of the political right. Mere liberals were called communists and spies and drummed out of their jobs. The political right sought to ban books and writers as subversive or…
Posted: 22 November 2020 [09:14 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Maybe it will turn out to be only a fluke, but amid the renewed panic about the virus epidemic there is some interesting detail in the monthly death statistics of the state Department of Public Health. In…
Posted: 18 November 2020 [04:39 PM] By CHRIS POWELL His handling of the virus epidemic has doubled Governor Lamont's public approval rating, giving him more fans than detractors. But judging from recent developments that are being overshadowed by the epidemic, the governor could be forgiven if…
Posted: 16 November 2020 [08:36 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Many teachers around the country are cheering the forthcoming change in national administration because Betsy DeVos will be replaced as secretary of the U.S. Education Department. DeVos, an heiress and philanthropist, has been a fan of charter…
Posted: 12 November 2020 [08:13 PM] By CHRIS POWELL After the supposedly slow response by Eversource Energy and United Illuminating to the widespread electricity outages in Connecticut caused by the tropical storm in August, there were calls for state government to take over the electricity distribution…
Posted: 10 November 2020 [04:28 PM] By CHRIS POWELL After warning that the U.S. Postal Service might sabotage the vast increase in voting by mail for last week's national election, leading Democrats in Connecticut are renewing their calls for allowing everyone to vote by mail just…
Posted: 08 November 2020 [07:35 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Everybody in Connecticut is tired of the virus epidemic, and no one is more entitled to be tired of it than Governor Lamont. It has devastated the finances of state government, commandeered its management, crippled education at…
Posted: 03 November 2020 [09:01 PM] By CHRIS POWELL When he was inaugurated as president of the University of Connecticut a year ago, Thomas C. Katsouleas made a grand gesture. He said that henceforth the university would waive tuition for new students from families with annual…
Posted: 02 November 2020 [07:51 PM] By CHRIS POWELL For four years any disparaging story about President Trump has been touted by national news organizations even if its source was anonymous. Of course given his business record and character it is easy to believe almost any…
MAYOR'S COLUMN: Telling Bristol's story as covid-19 continues Posted: 01 November 2020 [08:05 PM] By ELLEN ZOPPO-SASSU Bristol’s recent “Covid Orange Alert” has city officials facing a series of intertwined economic, public health and public relations…
Posted: 01 November 2020 [07:51 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Sailing against a heavy political wind, Republican candidates for the General Assembly have been heartened by the vigorous endorsements they are getting from police unions, which this year have broken away from the government employee union apparatus…
Posted: 29 October 2020 [09:19 PM] By MEL BARDELL To the Editor: Over the last 4 months, I have had the pleasure of volunteering with #andrewforbristol’s campaign. Not only has it been an incredibly rewarding learning experience - regarding even just a small portion of…
Posted: 29 October 2020 [09:10 PM] By CHRIS POWELL Every day Governor Lamont conscientiously reports the "positivity rate" of coronavirus tests administered in Connecticut, and news organizations report it as if the state's fate hangs on the data. Lately the "positivity rate," the percentage of tests…
Posted: 29 October 2020 [09:07 PM] By ROBERT A. SCALISE, JR. In Connecticut, the Probate Courts handle a variety of matters including guardianships, emancipation and adoption of children, conservatorships, mental health commitments and guardianships of persons with intellectual disabilities. However, when most people think of “Probate”…
Posted: 29 October 2020 [09:04 PM] By SEEMA VERMA Medicare’s annual Open Enrollment season is underway, and I want to encourage all people with Medicare to review their current health and prescription drug coverage. Under President Trump’s leadership, Medicare Advantage Plan premiums have fallen to historic…
Posted: 28 October 2020 [09:19 PM] By ELLEN ZOPPO-SASSU To the Editor: I want to share a few reasons why I am enthusiastic about the election and the potential of electing Mary Fortier and Andrew Rasmussen-Tuller, as well as re-electing Chris Ziogas to represent Bristol in…
