Columnist Running for governor, Democrat Ned Lamont faults Republican Bob Stefanowski for refusing to specify where he would cut state government spending to compensate for the enormous tax cutting Stefanowski implausibly pledges to do. The problem is that Lamont also…
Posted: 17 September 2018 [08:37 PM] Posted: 17 September 2018 [08:35 PM] By Paul Waldman After the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings gave the country a window into workplace sexual harassment - and featured a committee composed entirely of white men skeptically questioning the African-American woman detailing what she suffered…
Posted: 17 September 2018 [08:35 PM] Terrified of alienating the activist bases of their respective parties, Democrats and Republicans in Congress rarely even try to compromise anymore. So it’s a welcome development that two members of the House of Representatives from different parties are willing to…
Posted: 13 September 2018 [08:15 PM] Earlier this summer, Robert Runcie, the superintendent of schools in Broward County, Florida, sent a back-to-school message to the “families and community” of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. His missive mentioned nothing about teachers or books or curriculum. Instead it…
Posted: 13 September 2018 [08:13 PM] Bloomberg Opinion It may be human nature to want to assign blame for terrible events - and since climate change became part of public consciousness, it’s a frequently faulted for natural disasters. Is Hurricane Florence our fault for emitting climate-changing…
Posted: 13 September 2018 [08:11 PM] Ten years ago, amid a worsening subprime mortgage crisis, the U.S. government did what few have dared: It allowed a major global investment bank, Lehman Brothers Holdings, to file for bankruptcy. Within days, the shock waves crippled the nation’s largest…
Posted: 12 September 2018 [07:33 PM] The Washington Post Charming. Accomplished. Visionary. And, if you believe the highly credible accusations, one more thing: abusive. The first three qualities of CBS chief executive Les Moonves seemed as though they would allow him to stay at the peak…
Posted: 12 September 2018 [07:32 PM] Imagine being blamed for defending your integrity. Then understand that being attacked for speaking up is part of daily life for black women. See April Ryan, Maxine Waters, Kamala Harris, Susan Rice and Michelle Obama for a few examples of…
Posted: 12 September 2018 [07:28 PM] The Cleveland Plain Dealer For the third year in a row, the Cleveland Clinic has been named the nation’s No. 2 hospital in U.S. News & World Report rankings. Its numerical score - based on 16 specialties…
Posted: 11 September 2018 [09:10 PM] Dear Granddaddy, do you have any advice for a brand new freshman who is back at the bottom again? Damitrus - A ninth-grader Damitrus, first let me begin by saying that I’m pretty impressed with…
Posted: 10 September 2018 [08:21 PM] Bloomberg Everyone seems to agree on one thing about the anonymous Donald Trump administration official whose New York Times op-ed was Topic A for 36 hours, which is a pretty long time in Trump-calibrated politics: He or she deserves no…
Posted: 10 September 2018 [08:18 PM] Can a tweet stop another bloodbath in Syria? Evidently not. Hours after President Donald Trump used his favorite medium to warn Russia not to join in a new offensive on the northern province of Idlib, saying it would be “a…
Posted: 10 September 2018 [08:16 PM] Make no mistake: Facebook is feeling the pressure. Scarred by criticism that it enabled Russian meddling during the 2016 U.S. presidential election, the social media giant summoned its biggest tech peers to a summit late last month, meeting behind…
Posted: 09 September 2018 [09:05 PM] The Washington Post BOSTON - The day before Ayanna Pressley rattled national Democrats by overwhelming Rep. Mike Capuano, a popular 20-year incumbent, in last Tuesday’s primary, she brought her youthful canvassers to the campaign’s Jamaica Plain headquarters to fire them…
Posted: 09 September 2018 [09:04 PM] Nobody likes to be called “dumb,” especially if they are from the South. If you’re not from there, you may not understand this sensitivity, but it has existed for generations. One part of being a Southerner has been the…
Posted: 09 September 2018 [09:02 PM] The Washington Post A sexual-abuse report in Pennsylvania in mid-August created an earthquake within the Catholic Church. A court ordered last week that downloadable blueprints for 3-D-printed guns be banned from the Internet. And on Wednesday, oral arguments begin in…
Posted: 09 September 2018 [09:00 PM] Florida is facing a serious teacher shortage, and it’s no surprise given the low pay, low career esteem, long hours and bureaucratic burdens of standardized testing and paperwork. Making the state’s classrooms a more attractive place to work will require…
Posted: 07 September 2018 [07:20 PM] President Donald Trump’s purported breakthrough in relations with North Korea seems to have failed. Far from dismantling his country’s nuclear program, Kim Jong Un is still expanding his arsenal. He’s aiming to undermine international unity over sanctions, planning summits this…
Posted: 07 September 2018 [07:19 PM] So you’re mad at Nike for hiring someone you hate to hawk products you love. What are you to do? Nike got exactly what it wanted when it decided to make Colin Kaepernick the face of its latest round of…
Posted: 07 September 2018 [07:18 PM] From his remarks to reporters last week at the Crocodile Club lunch at Lake Compounce in Bristol, the Republican candidate for governor, Bob Stefanowski, seems to think it’s not important to tell voters how he would cut the half of…
Posted: 06 September 2018 [07:58 PM] After continued heavy opposition from constituents, New Britain Mayor Erin Stewart has joined Southington officials in withdrawing the city’s support for Tilcon’s plan to expand its operations into protected land. Finally, the mayor has done the right thing - more…
Posted: 06 September 2018 [07:56 PM] Like many states, Pennsylvania has authorized the use of automated camera systems at intersections to record and fine drivers who don’t stop for red lights. A major new study of red-light camera use in Texas, however, indicates that the camera…
Posted: 06 September 2018 [07:52 PM] The Washington Post There’s a line between needing to hear women’s painful stories and forcing women to relive them, and on Monday evening the line got blurry with Monica Lewinsky. On stage at an event in Jerusalem, ostensibly there to…
Posted: 06 September 2018 [07:50 PM] The latest attempt to get an accurate death toll in Puerto Rico following last year’s Hurricane Maria paints a grim picture: 2,975 “excess” deaths could be attributed to the storm, according to George Washington University researchers. That’s 46 times more…
Posted: 05 September 2018 [05:57 PM] Even by the standards of President Donald Trump’s administration, his proposal to freeze federal pay at current levels through 2019 counts as an unusually hypocritical policy choice. Perhaps this little gesture of government-bashing will provide a “drain the swamp” talking…
Posted: 05 September 2018 [05:54 PM] If you take seriously the revelations in Bob Woodward’s book “Fear” - and how can you not, given Woodward’s nearly half-century of scoops about Washington’s elite? - then it’s time for President Donald Trump to be removed from office via…
Posted: 05 September 2018 [05:54 PM] As the late Sen. John McCain’s departing call to national unity reverberated across America last week, Donald Trump’s prediction of violence should Democrats prevail in November’s midterm elections seemed both discordant and, well, weird. The president issued his dire warning…
Posted: 04 September 2018 [06:54 PM] Senate Democrats attempted to take control of the first day of confirmation hearings on Tuesday for Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court. The result was chaos - or at least what passes for chaos in the context of…
Posted: 04 September 2018 [06:54 PM] Along with his many other daily Tweet targets, President Trump can’t stop beating up on Jeff Sessions for being a lousy attorney general. When it comes to Sessions, the president leaves no petty pebble un-thrown. This week, Trump supposedly was…
Posted: 04 September 2018 [06:51 PM] Haters really gotta hate. Trolling has become the blood sport of the modern age. Somehow, it is “entertaining” to some to turn any topic - no matter how benign - into mean-spirited cyber bullying. Even old-fashioned harassment and public shaming…
Posted: 04 September 2018 [06:50 PM] Dear Granddaddy, how do you feel about the changes in the New Britain School District, which you work in? Sam B- Teacher. Well, Sam, I can tell you that change is never easy, especially if some passing-through school…
Posted: 03 September 2018 [07:49 PM] As society has evolved with defined gender roles becoming a thing of the past, the use of language in all areas of American life is slowly catching up with the fact that gender-specific language is no longer fashionable. So instead…
Posted: 03 September 2018 [07:48 PM] The Washington Post Not so long ago, Republicans figured that they’d pick up a half-dozen seats in the Senate. A slew of Democrats in states that President Donald Trump won (handily, in some cases) - North Dakota, Indiana, Montana, Ohio,…
Posted: 03 September 2018 [07:47 PM] Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum’s victory in the Democratic primary for Florida governor wasn’t even 12 hours old when his Republican challenger, Rep. Ron DeSantis, hurled a few race cards into the general-election campaign. Of course, he did this during an…
Posted: 03 September 2018 [07:45 PM] While the Trump administration’s reimposition of U.S. sanctions on Iran earlier this month grabbed the headlines, a more significant date is Nov. 4, when the truly crippling penalties - including those on Iranian oil - are slated to return. If…
Posted: 30 August 2018 [06:48 PM] Ever have a big argument with your spouse, and think you won it? But then later realize that the momentary satisfaction of victory pales against the good will you lost? And if your spouse is miserable, you’ll probably end up…
Posted: 30 August 2018 [06:47 PM] “No one deserves to die over playing a video game, you know.” That was the comment of one of the people who managed to escape from a gunman who shot up a gaming tournament in Jacksonville, Florida. The same thing…
Posted: 29 August 2018 [08:01 PM] Columnist Whenever a political party’s primary election nominates a candidate disliked by high-minded people, they consider it a failure of civic structure and propose to prevent recurrences by legislating open primaries, in which unaffiliated voters, not just party members, can…
Posted: 29 August 2018 [07:59 PM] Columnist WASHINGTON - Few politicians who fail to win the presidency are subsequently judged to be giants in our history. Among the select few are Robert F. Kennedy, Barry Goldwater and Hubert H. Humphrey in the 20th century; Henry Clay,…
Posted: 29 August 2018 [07:56 PM] Monday’s resignation of Seth Frotman, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s student loan ombudsman, should be a scandal of the first order. In an incendiary letter, Frotman claims the bureau’s political appointees are “undercutting enforcement of the law,” ending effective oversight…
Posted: 28 August 2018 [07:10 PM] Donald Trump’s petulant reaction to John McCain’s death could be analyzed only in terms of what it tells us about the president as a person. But it incident also reinforces some of the central themes of his presidency. Trump continues…
Posted: 28 August 2018 [07:10 PM] Protesters may have toppled “Silent Sam,” a Confederate monument at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, last week, but the university has vowed to reinstall it. Two hundred miles north, the figure of Gen. Robert E. Lee still…
Posted: 28 August 2018 [07:09 PM] When Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., died, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., lost one of his dear friends and his political and moral compass. For months as McCain’s health declined, Graham sank further into the quicksand of conspiracy theories (e.g. making a…
Posted: 27 August 2018 [08:05 PM] Columnist WASHINGTON - Juror No. 0302 may not have sought fame, but Paula Duncan will long be remembered in connection with Paul Manafort, whom she and 11 others convicted on eight counts of financial crime. What makes Duncan memorable, besides…
Posted: 27 August 2018 [08:03 PM] Bull market: Temper enthusiasm about subsidized stock market Why it matters: Betting on a stock market and economy with questionable foundations can be dangerous to consumers and business. Americans aren’t complaining that their 401K balances are decidedly to the positive…
Posted: 27 August 2018 [08:02 PM] The Washington Post My rule of thumb for months now has been to not think of the Trump White House as a presidency, but to think of it as a crime family like “The Godfather” and President Donald Trump as…
Posted: 26 August 2018 [08:38 PM] Columnist WASHINGTON -- Who lost Lehman Brothers? Could it have been saved? As we approach the 10th anniversary of Lehman’s collapse (Sept. 15), these questions won’t go away. The Lehman bankruptcy is portrayed as the pivotal event that converted severe…
Posted: 26 August 2018 [08:36 PM] Columnist Hysteria and vilification quickly have become the hallmarks of Connecticut’s campaign for governor, with Democrat Ned Lamont and Republican Bob Stefanowski and their surrogates hurling contempt and mock indignation at each other. Seizing on Stefanowski’s platform of phasing out…
Posted: 26 August 2018 [08:33 PM] The Washington Post President Donald Trump is on a tear, attacking his own Justice Department, hinting at a pardon for Paul Manafort and making excuses not to cooperate with the special counsel during an important investigation. (The last, in and…
Posted: 24 August 2018 [02:27 PM] Less than 24 hours after President Donald Trump’s former longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to campaign finance felonies he said Trump directed him to perpetrate, the president and his underlings had floated at least three different defenses. Each…
