Chris Powell: Students' vacuous righteousness; abortion phonies; stupidly erasing criminal records

Central Connecticut State University

MANCHESTER, Conn.

With a protest march on campus the other day, students at Central Connecticut State University, in New Britain, showed the world that they haven't learned what even kids in elementary school might be expected to know.

The students demanded that the university administration investigate a fellow student's complaint of sexual assault that had not yet been made formally to any police agency or to the university itself.

Instead, the accusation had been made by the complainant only on a social- media internet site, TikTok, which may be best known for posting videos encouraging young people to do stupid, dangerous, damaging, and even criminal things to get attention, the infamous "TikTok challenges."

As it turned out, the university had heard of the accusation on TikTok prior to the student protest march and already had hired some outsiders to investigate, the campus police and New Britain police apparently being considered incompetent.

Having handled the matter in such a strange way, the university was in no position to remind the student protesters that if you want the authorities to act against crime, the first thing to do is to report it to them. Central's campus is dotted with emergency telephone stations, and most young people these days would leave home in the morning without their shoes before they left without their mobile phones. But of course holding a protest march before there is anything to protest provides a rush of self-righteousness.

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U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, the Connecticut Democrat seeking election to a third term, isn't the only candidate for senator who is dissembling on the abortion issue.

Blumenthal says his abortion legislation in Congress, the Women's Health Protection Act, would simply put into federal law the policy articulated by the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade. But the Roe decision held that states properly could prohibit or regulate abortion after the viability of the unborn child, while Blumenthal's legislation would prohibit states from restriction abortion at any stage of pregnancy.

Blumenthal's Republican challenger, Leora Levy, recently deflected a request from Connecticut's Hearst newspapers to say what she thinks about South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham's legislation to outlaw abortions nationally after 15 weeks of gestation.

Levy used to support abortion rights. But during the primary campaign for the Republican Senate nomination, Levy declared herself to be completely anti-abortion and explained in detail why she had changed her mind. Now she seems to be changing her mind again.

“I am personally pro-life and I support exceptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother," she said in response to the inquiry from the Hearst papers about Graham's legislation. "When I am elected to the Senate, I will be accountable to the people of Connecticut for my votes and positions.”

That is, fervent opposition to abortion is helpful in winning a Republican primary but not in winning an election. Levy is so principled on abortion that she now wishes the issue would just go away. Yes, Levy will be accountable for her positions after the election -- when it's too late for voters to do anything about being misled.

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Erasing criminal records, thereby diminishing accountability from criminals, and increasing accountability from police officers have become great causes on the political left in Connecticut. The resolution of a recent case in Hartford Superior Court showed that the first cause can defeat the latter.

Over the objections of a prosecutor, Superior Court Judge Stephanie A. Damiani admitted a former Glastonbury police lieutenant, Kevin Troy, to two diversionary programs as he faced charges of drunken driving and interfering with police. Troy had gotten drunk, caused a rollover crash in Enfield, and then lied to police about it, telling them that someone else had been driving. Troy's completion of the programs will erase the records of his offenses.

Troy retired from the Glastonbury department after his arrest but is only 49 and might seek to return to police work elsewhere. With his criminal record erased, a big impediment to that will be out of the way.

Chris Powell is a columnist for the Journal Inquirer, in Manchester.

Chris Powell: Connecticut’s ‘self-defense’ terrorists

Bring them in.

MANCHESTER, Conn.

Connecticut has its own aspiring terrorist and subversive group, and it's not the Ku Klux Klan, the Proud Boys or even al-Qaeda.

No, it's the Self-Defense Brigade of "the Reverend" Cornell Lewis, of Hartford and Power Up Connecticut founder Keren Prescott, of Manchester, who are stomping around the state displaying guns and other weapons to show that they are serious about interfering with anyone they dislike and eventually overthrowing democratic government.

In candid interviews with the {Manchester} Journal Inquirer's Eric Bedner, Lewis and Prescott maintained that they aren't going to follow the laws and rules of decent conduct that apply to everyone else. Their politics elevates them above those things.

The Lewis-Prescott gang first paraded its guns at a protest June 9 at the site of construction of an Amazon warehouse in Windsor, Conn., in which two nooses had been found without any accompanying explanation. "There is nothing like Black people exercising their Second Amendment right to get folks moving," Prescott said. "We are tired of being nice."

Of course flaunting guns is a bit more threatening than whatever those unattended nooses meant.

Two days later on the Windsor town green the Lewis-Prescott gang broke up a "unity" rally against racism. Gang members, supposedly foes of racism, hurled racist taunts at the rally's organizers.

Prescott warns: "We are going to continue to disrupt."

Indeed, Lewis threatens the warehouse project with destruction. "We're going to close it down," he says. "They're not going to be able to work on that site for a while after we're finished with it."

Lewis's ambition goes farther. "Democracy," he says, "has failed the oppressed in this country. I believe democracy gave birth to and continues to nurture the endemic racism that the oppressed face. We must disrupt, dismantle, and then disperse the democratic system because it does not help us in our existential condition and the oppression we live with."

Of course, the country is full of self-obsessed loons who ordinarily are of little importance. The problem with the Lewis-Prescott gang is that state and local government officials, members of the clergy, and other well-meaning people, especially in Windsor and Manchester, have been humoring the gangsters either in the belief that their objectives have merit or out of fear of becoming their next target.

But the more the gangsters are humored, the more threatening they get.

The country and Connecticut are also full of racial disparities arising from pernicious government policies, such as social promotion in schools, subsidies for fatherlessness and exclusive zoning. But the Lewis-Prescott gang's obsession and fetish, the nooses found at the Amazon warehouse, could not be less relevant to racial justice. One of these days the worthies who have been humoring and helping to publicize the gang should find the courage to stop and leave them to the police and FBI.

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For a few days six weeks ago the killing of Henryk Gudelski was a sensation in Connecticut. But it has disappeared from the news and discussion at the state Capitol, where legislators expressed concern about it before adjourning. Gudelski was the 53-year-old New Britain resident run down in the city June 29 by a stolen car apparently driven by a 17-year-old boy with a long criminal record who still had been freed by the juvenile-justice system.

Legislative leaders said they would review juvenile justice procedures but nothing has happened, probably because nobody in authority wants to press the crucial questions, which were implied by a former state legislator and criminal justice expert who discussed the case in a radio interview two weeks ago. Somebody, the former legislator acknowledged, had "really messed up."

Indeed — but exactly who, how, and why, and how can the public and its representatives find out as long as the juvenile justice system remains secret by law? How does that secrecy benefit justice?

Of course it doesn't. Secrecy benefits only the proprietors of the system.

But this secrecy will be preserved because in Connecticut exempting government employees and failed policies from accountability remains more important politically than Gudelski's life — and anyone else's.

Chris Powell is a columnist for the Journal Inquirer, in Manchester.

'Sea of summer air'

Walnut Hill Park, in New Britain, Conn.

“All that is left of landscape lies at the bottom

of a sea of summer air; the town is drowned

under that sky, remote above the building

that in the picture scarcely clear the ground.’’

— From “The Prospect Before Us,’’ by Constance Carrier (1908-1991), Connecticut-based poet and high school teacher, most notably of Latin. This poem is based on the view from Walnut Hill Park, in New Britain, Conn., the old manufacturing city where she taught for years.

Lining it up

Digital image from 4” x 5” film negative by Shantell Martin (photo by Theo Coulumbe) in the show “NEW/NOW: Shantell Martin’’, at the New Britain (Conn.) Museum of American Art through April 18.
The museum says:

“One of the most versatile young artists working today, Shantell Martin is known for her exploration into the vast potential of the drawn line.’’

Do not use for navigation

“Lighthouse Series V” (acrylic on paper), by Helen Frankenthaler (1928-2011), in the show “Helen Frankenthaler Late Works,’’ at the New Britain (Conn.) Museum of American Art, Feb. 11-May 23.

It’s the first museum presentation dedicated to the exploration of works from Helen Frankenthaler’s late life, and features 22 works on paper from 1990-2003.

New Britain’s flag. Note the bees, meant to refer to the work ethic of the former major factory town’s residents.

Parks as places for ‘relief from ordinary cares’

Walnut Hill Park is a large public park west of the downtown of the old manufacturing city of New Britain, Conn. Developed beginning in the 1860s, it is an early work of Frederick Law Olmsted, with winding lanes, a band shell and the city's monument to its World War I soldiers.

“It is a scientific fact that the occasional contemplation of natural scenes of an impressive character, particularly if this contemplation occurs in connection with relief from ordinary cares, change of air and change of habits, is favorable to the health and vigor of men and especially to the health and vigor of their intellect beyond any other conditions which can be offered them, that it not only gives pleasure for the time being but increases the subsequent capacity for happiness and the means of securing happiness.”

— Frederick Law Olmsted (1822-1903), the father of American landscape architecture and most famous as the designer of New York’s Central Park. He was born in Hartford and died in Belmont, Mass.

In the “Emerald Necklace’’ parkland of Boston and Brookline, designed by Olmsted and established starting in 1878.

“Frederick Law Olmsted” (oil), by John Singer Sargent, 1895, at the Biltmore Estate, Asheville, N.C.

Chris Powell: Hartford (Rail) Line would work better if cities along it did, too

Hartford Line train in Hartford

Lauding the increase in passenger traffic in the first 18 months of the Springfield-Hartford-New Haven commuter railroad -- the Hartford Line -- Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont remarked the other week that he found it "astounding" that central Connecticut had gone without a commuter railroad for so long.

While the increase in traffic indeed is encouraging -- the millionth passenger appears to have ridden the restored line around Thanksgiving -- the long lack of commuter rail service between Springfield and New Haven is really not astounding at all. Because of the automobile and the commitment of government to highways, commuter rail service became deeply unprofitable in the 1950s and died in central Connecticut after the bankruptcy of the New Haven Railroad, in 1961. Amtrak's interstate service on the route long has been infrequent and clunky.

Commuter rail service from New Haven to New York survived the New Haven's bankruptcy because New York and Connecticut state governments have operated it with big subsidies as part of the Metro-North Railroad system. Heavy rush-hour traffic on the highways from New Haven to New York keeps the train attractive there despite the rickety tracks and bridges. But highway traffic between Springfield and New Haven seldom is bad enough to induce people to get out of their cars to take buses or the new commuter trains.

For passengers the new Hartford Line service is great and inexpensive, just $8 per ride. The line will get better as more stations are built. But when the service began in June 2018 every passenger trip was being subsidized by state government in the fantastic amount of $59. That subsidy was entirely operating cost, not counting the $700 million spent rebuilding the line. Even now, with ridership increasing, the subsidy per passenger trip is still about $56. A bus ride for a parallel trip costs a fraction of that.

It will be a miracle if the Hartford Line's per-passenger subsidy can be reduced someday even to $40, since the area served lacks the necessary population density and workforce flow patterns and since another prerequisite of a successful commuter railroad isn't always available: frequent bus, taxi, or subway service at major destinations.

But the Hartford Line seems like a far more promising transportation project than another heavily subsidized recent project, the Hartford-New Britain bus highway, which added little to commuting options that were already available. The Hartford Line's reach and service area are far greater. In a state that chose to encourage economic growth instead of just to cannibalize itself to pay pensions to government employees, something like the Hartford Line would be a much greater asset for "transit-oriented development."

Further, of course, highways represent government subsidies just as the new commuter railroad does -- so much so that highways have been given their own revenue streams with special taxes on gasoline and tires. Where population density is high and highways are already crowded, shifting subsidies toward mass transit makes sense.

Maybe the best government could do to build ridership on the Hartford Line would be to improve the demographics and commerce of the cities along it -- Springfield, Hartford, Meriden, and New Haven -- something that should be done for its own sake, quite apart from the success of the new railroad.

Improving the demographics of those cities will require examining what in government policy is perpetuating instead of eradicating the poverty there and thus driving self-sufficient people away from "transit-oriented development."

Chris Powell is a columnist for the Journal Inquirer, in Manchester, Conn.

Plotting, not idling

“Two Idlers” (detail), by Robert Frederick Blum (1857-1903), in the show “For America: Paintings from the National Academy of Design,’’ in New York, at the New Britain (Conn.) Museum of American Art through Jan. 26.

(This image courtesy of the American Federation of Arts.)

The show features artist members of the National Academy of Design, such as Thomas Eakins, Winslow Homer and Andrew Wyeth, along with masterworks from genres of art such as the Hudson River School and American Impressionism.

The New Britain Knitting Co. factory shown in this set of directions for washing some of its products, about 1915. For many decades the city was a major manufacturing center.

Chris Powell: Infrastructure projects not enough to offset slob culture

MANCHESTER, Conn. Geographically New London is spectacular, with Long Island Sound on one side and the Thames River on the other, and a beautiful old train station downtown with passenger service north to Boston and south to New Haven, New York, and beyond. The city practically shouts of potential.

Geographically Waterbury is spectacular too, built on hills along the Naugatuck River with sweeping views, an expansive downtown green, and its own beautiful old train station, which, while now occupied by the city's newspaper, the Republican-American, remains the terminus for passenger service to New York and beyond. Potential is also Waterbury's middle name.

Unfortunately the other day both cities were not realizing any potential but just having their noses rubbed in gritty reality.

In New London, as reported by the city's newspaper, The Day, nine downtown residents complained to a City Council meeting about disgusting misbehavior in their neighborhood -- public drunkenness and drug use, panhandling, vomiting, and worse by vagrants, whom political correctness has euphemized as "the homeless." The residents said they were not just offended but fearful.

"It's very intimidating and frightening walking alone," one told the council. "I love this city. I think this city has incredible potential. But with this situation, who wants to come here?"

Crime by predatory young men has been a chronic problem in downtown New London, the most infamous incident being the murder of a pizza shop worker 3½ years ago by a wolf pack of six who, upon their apprehension, said they had set out to assault someone because they were bored.

At the council meeting a deputy police chief sympathized with the complaints but offered only the weak hope of increased police patrols if the department ever recovers from a personnel shortage.

Meanwhile Waterbury was learning from the Republican-American that the state Department of Economic and Community Development had just ranked the city as the most distressed municipality in Connecticut, displacing Hartford, which had spent years at the top of the list and dropped to No. 2. New Britain and Bridgeport ranked third and fourth, the rankings calculated from personal income, employment, education levels and property values.

The newspaper quoted local officials as saying that a municipality ranked distressed has the advantage of some preference for state government financial grants. Yet that preference has not done much for Hartford, which, as the state capital for 140 years, long has had another advantage, hosting what are now thousands of well-paid state government jobs only to fall steadily from being perhaps the richest city in the country to being among the poorest 10.

Geography gives Hartford, New Britain, and Bridgeport great potential too, but as things have turned out, such natural advantages are not decisive for quality of life. Indeed, natural advantages seem to mean less over time, as does a municipality's physical infrastructure, on which state government lately has concentrated, with new government buildings erected in Waterbury and Hartford, the bus highway being built between Hartford and New Britain, the Coast Guard museum being planned in New London, and such.

No, the decisive element of a municipality's infrastructure and potential is only what it always has been:  the people who live there.  Capable, self-sufficient people can accomplish much, but a half century of public policy in Connecticut purporting to raise people out of poverty has only driven them into it deeper and made them more dependent on government, policy that has correlated only with urban decline and the explosion of a demoralizing slob culture.

Much  more than colleges relocated downtown, renovated theaters, convention centers and stadiums, Connecticut needs someone in authority to ask: What exactly has happened here and when is any of this stuff supposed to  work?

Chris Powell is managing editor of the Journal Inquirer, in Manchester, Conn.