Now that President Trump, the crotch grabber-in-chief, has (sort of) condemned neo-Nazism, the Ku Klux Klan, violence, and hate, obediently if belatedly citing each item on the Democratic Party's checklist, will people whose minds he has changed please raise their hands?

Is there even one such person?

Did nearly everyone really not already understand that the things on the checklist are reprehensible?

Does anyone really think that the crotch grabber-in-chief was sincere with his belated remarks rather than just posturing opportunistically to deflect the Democrats' own opportunistic posturing?

Does anyone really think the Democrats were sincere in their denunciation of the crotch grabber-in-chief for not using their checklist from the start? Does anyone really think that the Democrats are more concerned about the worsening embitterment and hysteria of national politics than about exploiting a chance to rile up their base and embarrass the crotch grabber-in-chief, as if he isn't pretty good at that all by himself?

Yes, the ascension of the crotch grabber-in-chief has emboldened certain crazies and strengthened their attraction to the Republican Party. But the crotch grabber-in-chief's ascension also has emboldened other crazies in  opposition  to him, from black separatists to immigration law nullifiers, some of whom have been welcomed enthusiastically into the Democratic Party.

After all, those who rioted in Charlottesville last weekend aren't the country's only violent crazies. Others rioted in Washington to disrupt the crotch grabber-in-chief's inauguration in January, and two months ago a deranged supporter of Democrat Bernie Sanders shot up the Republican congressional baseball practice in Alexandria.

Few people today look to national elected officials for moral leadership, and those officials are kidding themselves if they think that nobody can distinguish moral leadership from their usual posturing.
 

Number of Conn. state employees down, costs still up

Gov. Dannel Malloy likes to boast that his administration has shrunk state government's workforce by about 3,200 positions since he took office in 2011. But the Waterbury Republican-American's Paul Hughes reported lasyt week that the total annual cost of that workforce since the governor took office has risen from $5.5 billion to $6.3 billion. That is, while state government's workforce is smaller than it was six years ago, it is more expensive than ever.

Of course if state government had not reduced its workforce since Malloy took office, its cost would be even higher, so this is an accomplishment, just not one from which taxpayers can take as much consolation as the governor might like them to.

Besides, the true test of the government's workforce isn't what it costs but what it delivers.  Who would begrudge state government a few more employees if the workforce's total cost  declined?  Who would begrudge it a few more employees if that's what it took, say, to eliminate long waits at Motor Vehicles Department offices?

In the stalemate over the next state budget, which is eight weeks late, the effectiveness of state government has been almost completely overlooked. The governor is setting state government's spending by executive order because he and the General Assembly can't agree on how much tax revenue to raise, much less how it should be spent.

In these circumstances seriously evaluating state government's performance is pretty much out of the question. It may take a miracle just to get state government running more or less normally again, effective or not.


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