Connecticut 236 Years Later. The Long Road to Fiscal and Social Disaster

The time of Disaster has finally come, being long in the making. The bell now tolls for Connecticut, being the fifth state in our country since 1788. Ironically bearing the moniker of "The Constitution State," Connecticut seems to be gasping its' last breaths of its 236-year existence. 

The trip along the highway to disaster accelerated since the advent of the "cure-all" Utopian State Income Tax that was passed in 1991. Since that time, the state budget has increased from $7.9 billion dollars in 1991 to over $26 billion dollars in 2024. That is an increase of over 270%, far exceeding the rate of inflation. But has there been a great influx of new residents over thirty-five years? Hardly not. Connecticut's population has increased in the same period since 1991 by only 300,000 people from 3.2 million to 3.6 million in 2024. This is a 12% increase in 33 years, being far below the population increase in our country. So, using pure simple mathematics, there is no “population boom” nor teeming attraction for people to move into Connecticut. This realization is truly sickening, especially after the lies the Democrats and state-run media sources have fed to us to the contrary.

But that is just one symptom of the trip on the road to ruin. What was the cause? In recent history, we can start with Connecticut's Governor in 1991. The Governor was the liberal Republican turned Independent multi-millionaire Lowell Weicker, who was hailed at the time of enactment of the state income tax as saving the state from bankruptcy and cuts from essential services in the state. When looking back at some of the articles written during this debate, we heard that children would be starving, the homeless would have no place to go, and drug addicts would no longer be cared for if we did not enact the tax. The elderly would also become homeless with little to no social welfare programs for them, and anyone else would be in grave difficulty especially those most in need. Pedestrians would be shot and killed. Drug addicts would roam, rob, and pillage the streets! Women would be raped! Roads and bridges would be collapsing! Kids would come out of school stupid with no marketable skills whatsoever! Of course, these were all classic Connecticut Democrat Party talking points which have now turned into realities in Democrat Connecticut and are more solid realities after 35 years of separating Connecticut from their wallets and purses via tax money.

But on the road to the fiscal disaster Connecticut has a pattern of repeating its greatest hits. In 2024, Connecticut's Governor is the liberal Democrat vapid multi-millionaire King Ned Lamont, "The Unaccountable" who has helped to nurture massive increases in state spending, profited personally through questionable, unethical business dealings with no-bid state contracts going to firms such as Sema4  that were heavily invested in his wife's hedge fund Oak HC/FT, and has veto proof power in the State Legislature with an omnipotent one-party Democrat ruled majority.  As my friend and colleague Tony De Angelo pointed out this past week, SEC documents show that the Lamont-related interests made upwards of $77,000,000 in one day at the Sema4 public offering to a chorus of silence from anyone in the political sphere or corporate state-run media interests. But that egregious rape of ethics pales in comparison to the fact that any piece of liberal, socialist, or communist legislation can be rammed through and signed with ease by Lamont over the next two years. But what about that thing called Ethics? It is common knowledge that the Connecticut State Ethics Department could not find an elephant in the snow, and this has been made much more clear since the Lamont-related pillagings. The time for disaster has arrived for a true dictatorship and treasury leveraging never seen before anywhere in 236 years.

But despite the incredibly obscene and bulbous amounts of tax money collected by Connecticut over thirty-five years, it is ironic that in 2024 we see the same issues that the state prophesied in 1991. Children are not being cared for except for things such as gender change. There is still a homeless crisis. There is a massive illegal drug crisis. There is now massive crime and theft in the state. There are still massive infrastructure problems with constant road and bridge repair needed. Yet the state budget increased by over 270% with the state income tax. And Connecticut has $125 to $150 Billion dollars in short- and long-term debt along with unfunded liabilities that just never get mentioned, as the prevailing ideology is that saving the “fiscal guardrails” will save us all. Regrettably, nothing can be farther from the truth. As one cause, it is rarely discussed in 2024 that the bulk of the state's spending goes to state employee salaries, benefits, and pensions along with interest on the state debt. There is little to spend elsewhere. Read the state budget for this economic reality for yourself (https://portal.ct.gov/opm/bud-budgets/2024-2025-biennial-budget/fy-2024-2025-biennial-budget).

Connecticut’s 236-year road to disaster accelerated into the freeway fast lane since 1991. Since that time, the state has evolved into a cesspool of political nepotism, crime, serial incompetence, debt, and incoherent socialistic gibberish. Connecticut's state government caters to the well-connected and has little impetus to make life easier for those who are the indentured servants, the Connecticut Taxpayers who must fund this economic debacle. Could you run a company and earn a profit if the bulk of your business’s funds just paid for salaries, benefits, pensions, and debt service benefiting the old cronies on the top floor? But Connecticut's Democrat Party has no problem doing this. Why? How does it benefit Connecticut Taxpayers? In what way? Can anyone explain that to Connecticut Taxpayers?

Thus, Connecticut slogs along with high state taxes, high property taxes, high state debt, high homelessness, high crime, excessively high electric rates, high cost of living, massive unfunded liabilities, massive illegal drug problems, massive infrastructure problems and more.  It is not what our founders envisioned in 1788. Personal and economic freedoms should be flourishing in a state like Connecticut. Instead look forward to two more dismal years economically and socially in "The Constitution State" a state that its political class feel is theirs and theirs only. Citizen once again, be damned.