Author: Christopher Keating

The Courant’s Jon Lender reports:

The state Supreme Court on Tuesday reversed a lower court ruling that would have allowed Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz to run for state attorney general.

The ruling shockingly ends one of the most unusual chapters in Connecticut’s political history. Bysiewicz had been one of the leading candidates for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination until January, when Attorney General Richard Blumenthal’s decision to run for U.S. Senate prompted her to run for the office he was vacating.

Questions immediately arose over whether Bysiewicz met the requirements of a state statute that says Connecticut’s attorney general must have engaged in the “active practice” of law for 10 years in the state.

The statute doesn’t define what “active practice” means – and Bysiewicz went to court for a judge’s ruling to clarify the question. A Superior Court judge earlier this month found she was eligible — a decision overturned Tuesday on appeal from the state Republican Party.

 

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal defended himself Tuesday following a front-page article in The New York Times and a widely circulated video that showed him saying that he served in Vietnam.

With veterans standing behind him at a VFW Hall in West Hartford, Blumenthal said he regrets the times that he has misspoken about his service during the war.

When he misspoke, Blumenthal said it was “absolutely unintentional” and “totally unintentional.”

“On a few occasions, I have misspoken about my service, and I regret that,” Blumenthal said. “But I will not allow anyone to take a few missplaced words and impugn my record of service to my country. I served in the United States Marine Corps Reserves, and I am proud of it.”

Regarding a statement from his campaign that The New York Times story was a distortion, he said, “The article denigrates service in the reserves. … It really implies there were some special favors or treatment involved.”

He mentioned several times that, despite his Ivy League background at Harvard College and high-profile positions at a young age, he did not receive any special treatment in the military.

• Susan Campbell: AG Blumenthal Explains

Blumenthal, the front runner for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate, declined to comment about the role of Republican Linda McMahon’s campaign in providing information to the New York Times.

“I’m not going to say anything more,” Blumenthal said of the McMahon campaign.

In an uncharacteristic move, Blumenthal eventually cut off questioning from reporters and ended the news conference shortly before 2:40 p.m.

Regarding his military history, Blumenthal spoke in detail about how he came to serve.

“I volunteered to join the United States Marine Corps Reserves 40 years ago,” he said in his opening remarks at the news conference. “I went to boot camp at Parris Island.”

“I looked them up in a phonebook. No special help,” Blumenthal said. “Unlike many of my peers, I chose to join the military and serve my country. … There were no special favors.

• Pictures: Richard Blumenthal Under Fire For Public Statements About Military Service

As he has said many times in the past at veterans’ ceremonies at the state Capitol and around Connecticut, Blumenthal noted Tuesday that he reached the rank of sergeant before receiving an honorable discharge.

“I am proud of my service in the United States Marine Corps,” he said. “I am prouder still that my oldest son, Matthew, is serving in the United States Marine Corps Reserve.”

• Blumenthal’s Claims About Having Served In Vietnam Being Challenged
• What was the McMahon campaign’s role in the Blumenthal bombshell?
• Rob Simmons: Dick Blumenthal Owes An Apology To Vietnam Veterans; Says Linda McMahon Lied, Too

As one of the best-known politicians in Connecticut and a national figure as an attorney general with 20 years of service, Blumenthal has been the subject of feature articles for years.

“I can’t be responsible for all the mistakes in all the articles – thousands of them,” Blumenthal said of stories that have been written about him through the years.

Blumenthal was introduced by Peter Galgano, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who said that the allegations were “malicious” against Blumenthal. 

“Every Marine Corps ball I’ve attended since 2004,” Blumenthal was there, Galgano said.  “Marine Corps balls, funerals, homecomings, send-offs. … Through the hardest times, Dick Blumenthal has always, always been there for us. … He has always been completely straightforward about his honorable service in the Marine Corps Reserves.”

The incident in Norwalk in 2008 was “one quote where he misspoke,” Galgano said. “I could see where that quote could have been misread.”

During Galgano’s introduction, a veteran shouted, “Semper Fi!”

“He has always stood by us, and we are proud to stand by him,” Galgano said.

Jean Risley, chairperson of the Connecticut Vietnam Veterans Memorial who brought the Vietnam Wall to Coventry, said, “I’ve known Dick Blumenthal for many, many years. … We’ve gone to homecomings. We’ve gone to send-offs. … We’ve been at funerals. … In all that time, I never once heard him say that he was in Vietnam. I did hear him say how passionately he felt about our veterans and how we had to honor them.”

“There isn’t a nicer, more honorable, more responsive advocate for our Vietnam veterans, our veterans in general, than Dick Blumenthal,” Risley said. 

Despite a political firestorm about Attorney General Richard Blumenthal’s statements about his service during the Vietnam War, national Democrats were still behind him on Tuesday afternoon.

The Washington Post has the details at http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/05/national_dems_standing_by_blum.html

Republican candidate Rob Simmons, who served in Vietnam, says that Attorney General Richard Blumenthal owes an apology to all Vietnam veterans for statements that he has made about serving in the war-torn country.

Simmons, who often spoke about his service during multiple campaigns over his six years in the U.S. Congress, said veterans who actually served in Vietnam are very careful about how they speak about their experiences and whether they served in other coutnries during the war.

“He owes an apology to those whose service he has undeservedly capitalized on for his own political purposes,” Simmons said.

Simmons sharply criticized both of his main opponents in the U. S. Senate race –  Blumenthal and wrestling entrepreneur Linda McMahon of Greenwich.

“It was just a few weeks ago that The Hartford Courant revealed that McMahon, like Blumenthal, provided false information about her credentials,” Simmons said outside the state Capitol in Hartford. “She lied about her college degree, and she lied about her WWE background on her application to the state board of education. She also claims she doesn’t remember anything about the memo she authored that tipped off WWE’s steroid dealer to a federal criminal investigation. In reality, that was the smoking gun that nearly made Titan Towers into a federal office building and put her husband behind bars. How can she not remember that memo?”

He added, “Trust and character are qualities that cannot be bought, and they are issues in this race. Neither Attorney General Blumenthal nor Mrs. McMahon have lived up to the high standard that Connecticut demands.”

When asked if Blumenthal should step down from the race, Simmons responded, “I have not asked for that.”

Simmons said he had no criticisms of Blumenthal’s deferments that allowed him to avoid service in Vietnam.

“Which is fine if that’s what you want to do, but don’t come back 30 years later and tell people that you served in Vietnam when in fact you requested deferments from that service,” Simmons said. 

He also mentioned a clash during his race for the U.S. Congress in 2000 against U.S. Rep. Sam Gejdenson, whom he defeated in a tight race. During that campaign, issues were raised by Gejdenson’s supporters about Simmons’s record.

“I was falsely accused of being a war criminal,” Simmons said. “We were eventually able to prove it was false.”

Richard Blumenthal should resign because of questions about his record in the Vietnam era, says Lee Whitnum, a candidate for the U.S. Senate.

Whitnum has clashed with Blumenthal in the past regarding other issues, but she says that the Vietnam issue requires his resignation.

“He needs to resign,” Whitnum said in a statement Tuesday. “In light of lies about his military record but more important about his role in the financial meltdown that happened right here in Wilton” at the financial products division of AIG.

AIG has been highly criticized for awarding bonuses to employees after receiving federal bailout funds.

“The entire AIG FP fiasco could have been prevented,” Whitnum said. “He didn’t do his job and as a result, the greatest financial debacle and bailout in this recession took place right here in Wilton, Connecticut and the AIG FP guys just got bonuses – again.”

Reaction is pouring in from Connecticut and around the country on The New York Times story about U.S. Senate candidate Richard Blumenthal and his service in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve during the Vietnam era.

The story made news on CNN’s Anderson Cooper show, where Cooper said, “Politically, it makes no sense to do this.”

Longtime Democrat Paul Begala, who was a strong defender of President Bill Clinton, said, “It’s indefensible. It is a catastrophic mistake.”

The panel was talking about U.S. Senate races where Democrats were in trouble, including Arlen Specter, who is facing a difficult challenge in a primary Tuesday. CNN’s John King said that the Blumenthal case was “another wrinkle to another state” for Democrats across the nation.

The panelists, however, noted that they were responding as the story was breaking late Monday night and they had not yet heard Blumenthal’s full explanation.

http://muckrack.com/JoeNBC

Nate Silver: “A Murphy or DeLauro would be a safer bet”

Colin McEnroe: “For Blumenthal, integrity has always been given. What will happen to him if, suddenly, it’s not? ” 

Hearst Newspapers’ Brian Lockhart: “Who’s Worse: A candidate who fudges military service or one who gloats about the story?” 

TIME.com’s Swampland: Paging Chris Dodd

Cillizza: Possible Game changer?

Healy: “Blumenthal’s 30 Years of Shameful Lies”

NPR’s Ken Rudin: Shades of Wes Cooley

For years, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal has attended events for veterans and has often talked about his service in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves.

Those ceremonies have occurred at the state Capitol, where Blumenthal is a constant attendee, and at events around the state. Blumenthal pointedly mentions that he served in the military and often praises the older veterans in the audience by noting that they had attained a higher rank than he had in his service. 

But a story in The New York Times is now raising questions about Blumenthal’s military record and his service during the Vietnam War.

In a detailed story, reporter Raymond Hernandez mentions that Blumenthal spoke to a group in Norwalk in March 2008 at a ceremony that praised both veterans and senior citizens.

“We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam,” Blumenthal was quoted as saying. “And you exemplify it. Whatever we think about the war, whatever we call it — Afghanistan or Iraq — we owe our military men and women unconditional support.”

The Times story then stated, “There was one problem: Mr. Blumenthal, a Democrat now running for the United States Senate, never served in Vietnam. He obtained at least five military deferments from 1965 to 1970 and took repeated steps that enabled him to avoid going to war, according to records.”

Read the NYTimes.com story here.

Tom Foley of Greenwich – who is leading the Republican race for governor in the polls – announced Monday that he will be arriving at Saturday’s state party convention without a running mate.

Instead, he said he would serve with Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton or whomever wins the Republican primary for lieutenant governor on August 10.

“Let the Republican primary voters decide,” Foley said in an interview Monday. “I don’t want to be cutting deals and short-circuiting the process. … Let the primary voters decide and not the gubernatorial candidate.”

Boughton was introduced Monday as Lt. Gov. Michael Fedele’s running mate as they pledged their support to each other. Foley, though, said he would serve with the 46-year-old Boughton if they both win their respective primary races this summer.

“Mark Boughton is well qualified to be lieutenant governor,” Foley said.

If he wins the primary and eventually runs with Boughton in the general election in the fall, Foley said, “I don’t want it to look like he wasn’t my choice.”

Foley said he would also serve with Lisa Wilson-Foley of Simsbury if she wins the lieutenant governor’s primary – even though “I don’t know a whole lot about her.”

After establishing a detailed vetting process six weeks ago, Foley’s campaign contacted a number of Republicans recently and asked them if they would be interested in becoming lieutenant governor. But Foley emphasized that none of them had been offered the job. He eventually decided that the primary voters should decide.

Foley said there is a major difference between being asked if you are interested in a particular position and then actually being offered the job.

Two of those reportedly on Foley’s list – state Rep. Pam Z. Sawyer of Bolton and state Rep. Penny Bacchiochi of Somers – both showed up Monday at the state Capitol press conference where Fedele introduced Boughton as his running mate.

“I endorsed Fedele before Foley got into the campaign,” Sawyer told Capitol Watch. “I’m sure he’s picking someone else.”

Having a running mate can prove awkward because votes are cast separately for each office. In the 2006 Democratic primary, for example, Stamford Mayor Dannel Malloy lost in the governor’s primary, but his running mate, Mary Glassman of Simsbury, won her race for lieutenant governor with 57 percent of the vote over West Hartford’s Scott Slifka. Glassman then joined forces in the general election with New Haven Mayor John DeStefano, who had defeated Malloy.

Some insiders were stunned by Foley’s announcement about going solo.

“It’s pretty remarkable that a guy with $4 million cannot get a running mate going into the convention,” one longtime insider said. “I can’t figure out a reason why he would go to the convention without a running mate – strategically.” 
 

 

Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton pledged Monday that he will be a full partner as lieutenant governor if he is elected on the ticket with Republican Michael Fedele.

Fedele introduced Boughton as his running mate, saying that they intend to capture the nomination at Saturday’s Republican convention in Hartford.

But Boughton said after the announcement that they are planning a whole new structure for the lieutenant governor’s office than Fedele has had under Gov. M. Jodi Rell.

“I think he hasn’t been frankly utilized the way he should have been utilized in the previous administration,” Boughton said. “We’ve made a commitment that we’ll never run the lieutenant governor’s office like that again. You’ll be hearing from me. I’ll be vocal, and I’ll be Mike’s full partner in managing this state. … The bottom line is this will be much, much more than a ceremonial post. And I think the taxpayers deserve more, for $110,000 [per year in salary], than somebody that cuts ribbons and kisses babies.”

While Rell and Fedele have appeared at numerous news conferences together over the past three years, Rell has repeatedly refused to publicly endorse Fedele for governor. That has caused some consternation among Fedele supporters and questions among Republican voters.

“Certainly, that’s her decision,” Boughton said when asked about Rell’s non-endorsement of Fedele. “But you know what? Frankly, I’m not a big believer in endorsements. … It’s the endorsement of the voters that is the most important thing. The rest of it is just window-dressing.”

When asked, after Boughton’s comments, if he has been underutilized in the Rell administration, Fedele said, “Well, we all have our different styles. When I wasn’t being used, I went out and did my own stuff, which is economic development and reaching out to veterans and things of that nature. As you know, constitutionally, this is a part-time job. I have not worked it as a part-time job. I have been a full-time lieutenant governor. … There was more in me than I probably was utilized for. But again, that’s a different style.”

Concerning Boughton’s future role if they win the election, Fedele said, “The lieutenant governor in the Fedele administration is going to be at the table, all the time, rolling up sleeves and basically not taking any time off, to get the work done.”

(In photo, Lt.Gov. Michael Fedele, right, and Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton, left, answer questions from the media after Fedele announced Boughton as his running mate outside the Capitol in Hartford. AP Photo/Jessica Hill)

Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton is scheduled to drop out of the governor’s race Monday and join the ticket of Lt. Gov. Michael Fedele, sources said Sunday night.

Boughton had been seen by insiders as running third for the Republican nomination for governor behind Fedele and former U.S. Ambassador to Ireland Tom Foley of Greenwich, who have been widely viewed as the two GOP front runners.

As the longest-serving Republican mayor in Danbury’s history, Boughton has been on the stump in the governor’s race for months, serving up one-liners and touting Danbury as Connecticut’s safest city.

The Fedele campaign declined to make the announcement Sunday night, but said that Fedele “will announce his selection of a running mate” at 10:30 a.m. Monday at the state Capitol.

Boughton has been battling for the nomination with the two front runners, as well as longtime business executive Oz Griebel of Simsbury, financial analyst Christopher Duffy Acevedo of Branford, and former U.S. Rep. Larry DeNardis of Hamden.

While the delegate counts have been fluid, delegate-counters report that Fedele and Foley have roughly the same number of votes and Boughton has been in third place. Boughton’s hometown of Danbury, which is the eighth-largest city in the state, has 28 delegates. In addition, he had strong support in the Greater Danbury area and from his days as a state legislator in Hartford. Some insiders say that Boughton had the requisite 15 percent of the delegates to qualify for a primary.

Boughton has followed in the footsteps of his father, who also previously served as Danbury’s mayor and as a state legislator from the districts – posts that his son later won.

Besides relying on Boughton’s delegates to help push him toward the nomination, Fedele will receive the benefit of an entirely new base of campaign contributors to help Fedele raise the necessary $250,000 that is required to qualify for public financing. Fedele is about 80 percent toward the goal, and public financing could bring him as much as $2.5 million for an expected primary in August.

The financing is crucial for Fedele because he is running against Foley, a multi-millionaire who has already poured $2 million of his own money into the campaign. Foley is also raising money under the old rules, meaning that he is turning down public financing and is instead collecting as much as $3,500 per person from contributors.

While the delegate count is said to be close, Foley has been far ahead in the public polls. The latest Quinnipiac University poll showed Foley with about 30 percent of those polled, while Fedele was far behind at about 4 percent.

Foley, a Harvard graduate who has never held public office and has more than two decades of business experience, has been broadcasting television commercials on a regular basis – dating back to his initial run in the U.S. Senate race and then continuing when he switched to the governor’s race. Fedele, by contrast, has not been running a similar TV blitz but instead has focused on the Fox News Channel, News 12 in Fairfield County and the “Morning Joe” program on MSNBC in an attempt to reach conservative Republicans and delegates in a targeted television campaign.

Besides Linda McMahon in the U.S. Senate race, Foley has been on television as much as any candidate in the race. Democrat Ned Lamonthas recently burst onto the scene with an advertising blitz, as well as extensive advertising on Internet sites.

The endorsement by Boughton would provide a boost for Fedele as he heads into Saturday’s convention in Hartford and would come on the heels of recent endorsements by former U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays, House Republican leader Larry Cafero of Norwalk, Stratford Mayor John Harkins, and two former state GOP chairmen – Chris DePino and George Gallo. 

The state Senate debated Friday over a plan to de-authorize a net $422 million in bond authoritizations that had been previously approved by the legislature.

As such, the state will now have more leeway to approve other projects because there were 255 individual cancelations Friday – paving the way for new bonding capacity for other programs.

Sen. Donald DeFronzo, a New Britain Democrat, handled most of the complex effort, which came after Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell initially offered bond cancelations as part of her budget in February.

“It’s a significant legislative achievement,” DeFronzo said, referring to a unanimous vote in the finance committee and the measure’s overall support. “This was a good example of bipartisanship. … No one in this building can remember the last time that we canceled this much in authorizations. … Almost everybody came forward this year and sacrificed something.”

Sen. Andrew Roraback, a Goshen Republican, said he hopes the legislature will “not reverse the progress that is being made today” by simply approving other bond projects in the coming months.

“Now that we’ve taken the step and tightened the belt,” lawmakers should not immediately approve other projects, said Sen. Leonard Fasano, a Senate GOP deputy leader. “This is a big step. We should look at this more often and continue to reduce our debt.”

After a relatively brief debate on the Senate floor, lawmakers moved shortly before 5 p.m. to place the bill on the “consent calendar” for bills that have no opposition.

A bill that would extend the statute of limitations in child sexual abuse cases was officially withdrawn Friday – ending an emotional debate at the Capitol for this year.

The measure’s chief proponents were unable to garner enough support in the House of Representatives and the Senate, but they said they will try again in the future.

Sen. Mary Ann Handley, a Manchester Democrat who is not seeking re-election, said she could not say how many votes she had in the 36-member Senate.

“You’re running a marathon, not a sprint,” Handley said. “I’m retiring, but I’ll be back on this issue. I’ll tell you that.”

The bill was directly related to the allegations of child sexual abuse against Dr. George Reardon, who worked at St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center in Hartford from 1963 to 1993. The bill, though, never mentioned either the hospital or Reardon by name.

“I’m happy that it is withdrawn because we thought it was a horrendous bill,” said Michael Culhane, a spokesman for the Connecticut Catholic Conference, which represents the bishops at the state Capitol. “The retroactivity of the bill is just terrible. It would be my hope that an effort would be made to resolve these issues, but I’m not part of that process.”

During a public hearing on March 17, an attorney for the Catholic Church said the bill was unconstitutional.

The bishops had said publicly that the passage of the bill would have had a devastating financial impact on the church and parishes around Connecticut.

“It is a fact that there are seven or eight dioceses across the country that have filed for bankruptcy because of this issue, so that’s a possibility, not a fact going forward,” Culhane said. “Based on the experience of the church dealing with those dioceses, that was a possibility.”

Neither Culhane nor any of the legislators could provide a definitive answer Friday on whether there will be a settlement or resolution of the lawsuits against St. Francis Hospital before they are scheduled to go to trial.

The bill has now failed for two consecutive years at the Capitol. A version last year never made it out of committee, but this year’s version was approved, 23 to 20, by the judiciary committee. But insiders knew that the bill was in trouble because highly controversial bills traditionally need a wider margin of support in the judiciary committee if they are going to be approved by the full legislature.

State Rep. Beth Bye, a co-sponsor of the bill, declined to reveal the exact vote count in the House, where 76 votes are needed for passage,

While some said that the bill had 58 votes in favor about 10 days ago, Bye said she had “certainly more” than 58.

House Republican leader Lawrence Cafero of Norwalk, who has handled zoning cases as an attorney, said the bill was so narrowly written that it would only affect St. Francis Hospital.

“Spot zoning is illegal,” Cafero said Friday. “It was carefully crafted to affect one particular case.”

If a victim had been molested by a doctor at Norwalk Hospital and there were no other pending cases or claims, then “they are shut out from suit” in the bill, Cafero said. “That’s wrong.”

Cafero, who had previously described Reardon as “a piece of garbage,” said Friday that he was “an animal.”

Reardon died in 1998, but the case arose when evidence surfaced in 2007 after a homeowner renovating Reardon’s former West Hartford home discovered a cache of more than 50,000 slides and 100 movie reels of child pornography.

While the case and the bill focused on Reardon and the hospital, other groups that are not directly involved in that case have lobbied against the bill and contributed to its defeat. Among them are the Insurance Association of Connecticut and the American Tort Reform Association, which raised concerns about changing the statute of limitations. The judiciary committee’s influential co-chairman, Sen. Andrew McDonald, voted against the bill at the committee level because of his concern about the statute.

The defeat of the bill does not end the cases of the 56 plaintiffs who are aged 48 or older. Plaintiff attorneys are pursuing various legal theories in an attempt to get around the statute of limitations for those cases, but those arguments could be difficult to win.

Barbara Blaine, President of SNAP, which is the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, said lawmakers had made the wrong move by opposing the bill.

“Even if every single person who was sexually assaulted by Reardon in childhood gets some kind of settlement, that doesn’t absolve lawmakers of the duty to protect children by giving victims the chance to warn families about predators through the justice system,” Blaine said in a statement. “We commend the courageous and compassionate abuse victims who have worked so long to safeguard the vulnerable and heal the wounded through this legislative effort and hope they will have the strength and persistence to push even harder next session.”

SNAP notes that, although the word “priest” is mentioned in the group’s title, it includes “members who were molested by religious figures of all denominations,” including rabbis, Protestant ministers and bishops.

For a detailed account of the bill’s problems in an earlier Capitol Watch post, click here.

State Rep. Stephen Dargan, a veteran West Haven Democrat who often makes predictions, says the legislature will not reach a budget deal before the General Assembly’s mandated adjournment at midnight May 5.

“I’ve got a better chance of picking the winner of the Kentucky Derby this Saturday than that happening,” said Dargan, a longtime horse-picker who often heads up to the Saratoga Race Course during the hot days in August.

 

A high-profile bill on extending the statute of limitations for child sexual abuse appeared in severe trouble Thursday night because of a lack of support in the state House of Representatives and Senate.

Lawmakers declined to declare that the bill was officially dead, but no one would say that the bill has enough votes to pass in either chamber in Hartford.

Rep. Beth Bye, a West Hartford Democrat who co-sponsored the bill, declined to say how many votes she has in favor of the bill in the House, but she said it was “certainly more” than the 58 that had been mentioned in recent days. She said Thursday night that she needed to speak to more legislators and victims, and an announcement on the bill’s fate could come as early as Friday.

“We’re not there yet” in the Senate, Bye said.

The bill is related directly to the allegations of sexual abuse against Dr. George Reardon, who worked at St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center in Hartford from 1963 to 1993. The bill, however, mentions no particular entity or individual by name.

Reardon died in 1998, but the case arose when evidence surfaced in 2007 after a homeowner renovating Reardon’s former West Hartford home discovered a cache of more than 50,000 slides and 100 movie reels of child pornography.

While the case and the bill have focused on Reardon and the hospital, other groups that are not directly involved in the case have lobbied against the bill at the state Capitol because of their concerns about changing the statute of limitations. Those include the Insurance Association of Connecticut and the American Tort Reform Association.

The high-profile bill has never had majority support in the legislature. One version failed last year, while this year’s version passed by 23 to 20 in the judiciary committee. Controversial bills traditionally need a wider margin of support in the judiciary committee if they are going to have a solid chance of being passed by both chambers.

The committee’s influential co-chairman, Sen. Andrew McDonald of Stamford, is opposed to extending the statute of limitations.

With less than one week left in the legislative session, McDonald said that the General Assembly’s overriding interest in resolving state budget issues might not allow enough time for the bill to be considered. While McDonald said that it’s impossible not to sympathize with the pain of the victims, he and others still oppose the bill that came out of his committee on broad legal grounds that relate to the essential function of statutes of limitation in society.

If the House passed the bill, he said, he would not use his chairman’s role to try to block its consideration in the Senate. But he said the likely length of the debate on the bill  – which he estimated at “10 or 12 or 14 hours” in each of the two chambers – might spoil its chances with so much other pressing business in so little remaining time before Wednesday’s scheduled legislative adjournment.

If the bill doesn’t pass, McDonald said that shouldn’t prevent St. Francis from creating a fund “to compensate those who might not have legal recourse.”  It’s not only a matter of legal recourse, he said, but also of “moral obligation.” 

The demise of the bill does not end the cases of the 56 plaintiffs who are 48 and older. Plaintiff attorneys are pursuing legal theories that could get around the statute of limitations for those cases, although those arguments could be difficult to win.

House Republican leader Lawrence Cafero of Norwalk said the bill was unfair because it was so narrowly written that it would apply only to St. Francis Hospital.

“If we truly want to be fair, then extend the statute of limitations to everybody,” Cafero said Thursday night. “Justice is supposed to be blind. In life, you can’t constantly be looking over your shoulder or you can’t move forward. Historically, that’s the purpose of the statute of limitations.”

While he described Reardon as “a piece of garbage,” Cafero said the bill “carves out this unique exception” that would become a bad law.

“It’s the sexual assault equivalent of spot zoning,” Cafero said.

Senate Majority Leader Martin Looney, who oversees the agenda in the Senate, would not say whether the bill will be considered in the final days.

“That depends on the House,” Looney said Thursday night. “We’ll consider it if it’s taken up in the House. We have not caucused it in the Senate.”

Connecticut Post columnist Ken Dixon has been known to be candid.

As a reporter for decades, he has seen many politicians come and go. So, as a veteran journalist, he was asked to be the moderator this week at a Bridgeport hotel for a debate that featured 10 aspirants for the governor’s office.

Before the debate even started, Dixon looked down the long, long table at the 10 candidates and said to the crowd: “I, like you, am looking forward to the conventions next week when half of these people will disappear.”

The crowd that gathered for the debate, sponsored by the Bridgeport Regional Business Council, both laughed and groaned.

The Republican and Democratic state conventions will be held on the same days – May 21 and May 22 – and they will both be held in Hartford. The Democrats will have 1,834 delegates at the Expo Center in the North Meadows, while the Republicans will have 1,465 delegates at the Connecticut Convention Center.

Republican Rob Russo dropped out of the race for Congress on Thursday and endorsed state Sen. Dan Debicella in the Fourth Congressional District.

Russo, a former aide to U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays and a former state senator, said that Debicella is the best Republican to run against U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, a Greenwich Democrat who ended Shays’s 21-year tenure in the 2008 election. 

“This has not been an easy decision, but I am convinced it is the right one,” Russo wrote in a letter to supporters. “I entered the race for Congress seven months ago because I strongly believed that Fairfield County desperately needed that independent leadership in Congress that we all admired so much in Christopher Shays and Stewart McKinney before him.”

He added, “We cannot afford to re-elect a Congressman who blindly follows his party bosses while he ignores the people he was elected to serve.  Seven months later, I still believe all this to be true. Having talked with many of the delegates to the Fourth District Republican convention, it is my belief that I would garner more than enough votes to qualify to challenge the party-endorsed candidate in a primary. However, I do not believe that forcing a primary is in the best interests of our party.”

Instead, he said Republican voters in Fairfield County need to rally around a single candidate.

“We need to support a fiscal conservative who understands the federal government cannot solve all of our problems,” Russo said. “We need a strong candidate who understands how the Democrats’ health care bill will harm our country, and will do what needs to be done to fix it. I believe this candidate is my good friend, Dan Debicella.”

Debicella is a Shelton Republican who graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and received an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School. Himes is a Rhodes Scholar from Greenwich who once worked at the investment powerhouse Goldman Sachs. 

One day after union talks broke down, the Rell administration and state employee unions are still at odds over the failure to approve an early retirement program for state employees.

The two sides cannot even agree on what happened at the meeting. The Rell administration blames the unions, while the unions blame Rell.

Rell says flatly that the unions summarily rejected the ERIP, but the unions say it’s more complicated than that.

‘The talks broke down last night because the administration’s representatives left the room,” said Matt O’Connor, a spokesman for the State Employee Bargaining Agent Coalition, known as SEBAC. “I was there. I was in the room while both sides talked. I was in the room while the union leaders caucused.”

The union leaders had met for about 45 minutes in a pre-meeting caucus before budget director Robert Genuario, chief negotiator Saranne Murray of the Shipman and Goodwin law firm, and others arrived at the Council 4/AFSCME union hall in New Britain.  O’Connor estimated that there were 20 representatives of the Rell administration and 30 union representatives in the room.

Republicans say that an estimated 8,000 state employees would be eligible for the ERIP, and an estimated 2,000 would take the retirement package. If 1,000 positions are re-filled, the state workforce would then drop by 1,000 positions at an estimated savings of $65 million per year.

Rell’s supporters said the union leaders were adamant that they didn’t want to talk about anything but the ERIP.

“Never said that,” O’Connor said. “What we did say was we should be talking about the ERIP. … We did say we wanted to talk about our 18-point plan – our cost-savings proposal. There are immediate cost savings. There are cost savings that are much more long-term in nature.” 

Regarding the union’s contention that the Rell administration “stormed out” of the meeting, Rell’s supporters say that Genuario, who is known for being calm, cool and collected, remained that way Monday night. Some insiders say it was Murray who made the first move to leave the meeting after saying “we’ll take that as a no” on the ERIP.

At the meeting, the unions were asking for numbers to show exactly what would happen to state services if the ERIP is approved and if, for example, 1,000 state employees left their jobs. In addition, they wanted to know what would happen to the unfunded liability in the state pension fund.

“That shouldn’t be that tough to produce,” O’Connor told Capitol Watch. “It shouldn’t have been that tough to show up with some numbers yesterday. … This is a serious proposal. You come with your arguments. … We did ask some actuaries to give us some estimates” for the union.

“We didn’t see the details of the plan until last night,” O’Connor said. “Maybe this should have been presented much sooner. Maybe back in January when we first met – when we presented the 18-point plan.”

Since then, the Rell administration has sought various concessions, such as additional furlough days and additional wage freezes. Those have been rejected, and the legislature has been struggling to balance the budget for the next fiscal year before the legislative session ends at midnight on May 5.

House Republican leader Larry Cafero of Norwalk says that union leaders have been under pressure from members who want to take the early retirement incentive.

After the dust-up on Wednesday night, no further talks have been scheduled.

“We can all agree there was no agreement,” O’Connor said.

The state budget process just got more difficult.

On Wednesday night, the state employee unions rejected the Rell administration’s offer to help balance the state budget by offering an early retirement incentive program to as many as 8,000 state employees.

The two sides had different versions of what happened at the contentious meeting. The unions said that Rell’s representatives “stormed out” of the meeting, but Rell’s supporters said that the administration’s budget director, Robert Genuario, has built a reputation over the years for being a mild-mannered negotiator who has never been known for storming out or even raising his voice.

“The governor is extremely disappointed that SEBAC – the coalition of state employee unions – tonight summarily rejected any consideration of an early retirement plan to save $65 million in state budget costs,” the administration said in a statement shortly before 10 p.m. “She is also disappointed that SEBAC would not allow the administration to put alternative cost-saving measures on the table. Governor Rell believes it is a time for renewed respect and cooperation, not intractability and hyperbole.”

Thirteen minutes before Rell issued her statement, the union coalition issued an e-mail that said that Rell’s agents had stormed out “after failing to produce” an analysis of the costs to the state pension plan of the early retirement incentive plan, known as an ERIP. Republicans have said that an estimated 8,000 state employees would be eligible, and an estimated 2,000 employees would take the offer. A projected 1,000 positions would be re-filled, and the state would thus eliminate 1,000 positions at an annual savings of $65 million.

A Capitol insider said the union leaders made it clear that they would not talk about anything but the ERIP, even though Rell’s negotiators wanted to breach other ideas. After a while, Rell’s negotiators said it was clearly obvious that nothing was going to be accomplished at the meeting.

The next move remained unclear late Wednesday night. House Republican leader Lawrence Cafero of Norwalk said recently that the state does not need approval from the unions to move ahead with the ERIP because the program is not a concession. He added that case law has allowed the practice. Rell, however, said recently that the easiest way to enact the ERIP was with union agreement.

Through spokesman Matt O’Connor, SEBAC issued statements from various union presidents in the coalition.

“We’re terribly understaffed already,” said Carmen Boudier, president of New England Healthcare Employees Union, District 1199/SEIU. “We have healthcare workers and corrections officers struggling through mandatory double shifts, and the state trooper force is below its statutory minimum. When bridges are found to need repairs, we don’t even have enough maintenance professionals to repair them,” she said.

Dave Walsh, president of the American Association of University Professors – CCSU, said in a statement: “College students are struggling to find courses they need to graduate, and we have backups and waiting lists for workers needing job services, and for businesses needing permits to create jobs. Why would the governor want to make a bad situation worse?”

The unions have details on their budget positions at www.InThisTogetherCT.org

 

 

In what is essentially a gigantic refinancing, Gov. M. Jodi Rell announced a new budget-cutting plan Wednesday that involves less borrowing at a lower interest rate to save $337 million more than a Democratic plan.

The move would allow the state to reject all plans for “securitization,” a complex borrowing mechanism that has been opposed by both Republicans and Democrats. The highly unpopular idea would thus be dropped in an election year, and no lawmakers would be prompted into voting for securitization as the November election approaches.

The state had been planning to use various state revenues as collateral in order to borrow $1.3 billion for the 2011 fiscal year in the securitization plan, but Democratic legislators strongly rejected Rell’s idea of legalizing the Keno gambling game and using an expected $60 million in annual revenue to help pay off the bonds.

In addition, Rell is calling for turning the operation of the state-owned Bradley International Airport into a quasi-public agency that would generate an additional $25 million per year for state coffers. Bradley would essentially be run like a port authority – as in other states – and would have more flexibility in dealing with airlines and vendors than the state currently has, officials said.

In a complicated series of moves that need legislative approval, Rell is now calling for borrowing money at 3 percent, rather than 4 percent – which is 1 percentage point but a 25 percent rate difference. In addition, the borrowed money would be repaid in 7 years, rather than 10 years – thus saving the state money.

Like a complicated chess game, the plan involves a series of moves that are contingent upon each other. The proposal involves transferring more than $1 billion in the state’s “rainy day” fund from the 2010 fiscal year into the 2011 year, plus moves involving the competitive transition assessment on electric bills, the Energy Conservation and Load Management Fund, and the Renewable Energy Investment Fund. Upon hearing about the complex and multi-pronged deal, one longtime lobbyist asked if Wall Street investor Bernard Madoff was involved in the deal.

“I think it’s a sound plan,” Rell told reporters in her Capitol office. “If there are other suggestions, I welcome them.”

After meeting with Rell, the top legislative leaders had little comment on the complex plan, saying they needed to analyze the proposal to see if the numbers add up.

“I think it could help move things forward,” said Senate President Pro Tem Donald Williams of Brooklyn.

At the same time, Rell is also proposing to “sweep” environmental funds to help pay for shortfalls in the state’s general fund. The New Haven-based Connecticut Fund For the Environment criticized Rell for calling for sweeping 50 percent of the Connecticut Energy Efficiency Fund and the Connecticut Clean Energy Fund.

Charles Rothenberger, staff attorney for Connecticut Fund for the Environment, said in a statement, “This is unequivocally the wrong direction for the state.  For months, the legislature and the clean energy business community have been working to improve Connecticut’s economic future. Supporting clean energy jobs, reducing energy costs, and freeing up money that can be spent in other areas of the economy are part of these efforts. The administration is eviscerating these efforts by reversing course.”

The energy funds, according to CFE, supports nearly 12,000 jobs, including those involved in fuel-cell manufacturing, solar installation, and fuel cell manufacturing, and energy auditing. The funds support programs that help consumers make energy-saving improvements to their homes and businesses.

The CFE stated, “Earlier this year, the governor put forth a proposal to securitize 37 percent of the customer ratepayer funds and in 2009, a similar plan to securitize the funds called for stripping $50 million from the funds each year for two years and moving $52 million from the funds to the general fund each year for the next decade to securitize a $350 million payment to the general fund. Met with strong opposition from business leaders, state policymakers, and environmental advocates, that plan was scrapped and the resulting investment in the clean energy and energy efficiency funds allowed the state to leverage state spending and take advantage of a $38.5 million federal stimulus investment.”

Christopher Phelps, the executive director of Environment Connecticut, said, “With her proposal, Governor Rell has turned her back on clean energy businesses such as solar installers and fuel cell entrepreneurs. It would slash weatherization and energy efficiency programs that help families and small businesses on Main Streets across the state cut their energy bills and put money back in their pockets. The result will hurt out economy and hamstring programs that are helping Connecticut cut its dependence on polluting energy sources that contribute to air and global warming pollution.”

Phelps added, “As the cliché goes, this is a penny-wise, pound foolish proposal. In fact, Governor Rell has dispensed with half of the cliché and chosen instead to simply be pound foolish.”
 

Former U.S. Rep. Sam Gejdenson endorsed Greenwich entrepreneur Ned Lamont for governor Wednesday – four years after he supported New Haven Mayor John DeStefano for the same post.

Gejdenson was one of Connecticut’s best-known Democrats when served in the U.S. Congress for 20 years before losing in 2000 to Republican Rob Simmons, who is now running for the U.S. Senate.

“Ned has a proven record of not only creating jobs, but also standing up to the establishment and doing what it takes to deliver for the people of Connecticut,” Gejdenson said in a statement Wednesday. “I trust him to be the type of governor we need to put people back to work and get Connecticut back on offense competing for jobs and commerce worldwide.”

In 2006, Gejdenson became involved in a high-profile clash when he went public to say that he had received a push-poll from the campaign of gubernatorial candidate Dannel Malloy.

The whole thing started when Gejdenson said he picked up his telephone at his Branford home on Monday, July 24, 2006, to find a political pollster on the other end. The conversation started innocently as the caller asked whether the state was going in the right direction and how he felt about the races for governor and the U.S. Senate. But as soon as Gejdenson said he was voting for DeStefano instead of Malloy in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, he said the conversation abruptly turned to a series of anti-DeStefano questions.

What the pollster did not know was that the Branford man was Gejdenson, the former U.S. House member who had already publicly endorsed DeStefano.

“There was a lot of noise in the background, so it was a big phone-bank operation,” Gejdenson said at the time. “It was definitely just a push poll to beat up the other guy. They said [DeStefano’s hometown of] New Haven was dangerous. I’ve never felt endangered in New Haven.”

Malloy’s supporters, who were not on the telephone call between Gejdenson and the pollster, argued repeatedly and vociferously that it was not a push poll.

“If Sam Gejdenson thinks he got a push poll, it certainly wasn’t from the Malloy campaign or anyone we consider supporters,” campaign manager Chris Cooney said at the time.

Even though the Malloy campaign had been conducting research polling for two years, Cooney said, “We have never done push-polling, ever.”

After serving in Congress for 20 years, Gejdenson said that he clearly knew the difference between a push poll and a research poll.

Push-polling is a campaign practice in which candidates spread disinformation and sometimes outright lies about each other in the guise of an opinion survey. The line between that and the more accepted practice of research polling, in which candidates try to determine what messages might work best against their opponents, can be thin.

At the time, DeStefano’s spokesman, former television reporter Derek Slap, strongly defended Gejdenson and denied that the DeStefano campaign had made any anti-Malloy calls.

“We’d expect this from Karl Rove, but not from Dan Malloy,” Slap said at the time. “Are they calling Sam Gejdenson a liar?”