Ring out the old, bring in the new

Chris Powell would blush to hear someone say it, but his retirement from the Journal Inquirer in January will leave a gaping hole in Connecticut journalism.

Fortunately, Powell’s voice will still ring out in his columns. His columns, many of them analytical jewels, always have had in them just enough bite to awaken slumberous readers.

Unlike some commentators, he has managed to keep himself out of his writings, which in the age of twitter may be a sign of saintliness.

President Donald Trump may survive moves to eject him from his presidency, a consummation devoutly wished by two of Connecticut’s fiercest antiTrumpers, U.S. Senators Dick Blumenthal and Chris Murphy. The state’s junior senator, Murphy, will be up for re-election in the new year.

Connecticut likely will suffer from that provision in the new tax reform bill that will prevent high tax states – we have the distinction of being the third highest taxed state in the nation, lagging behind New Jersey and New York — from offering write-off provisions for state taxes. There may, however, be ancillary benefits to Trump’s tax reforms.

Many economists familiar with President John Kennedy’s tax reforms, nearly identical to those of Presidents Ronald Reagan and Trump, anticipate increases in job production and GDP growth, a rising tide that will, as Kennedy once put it, lift all the boats – including Connecticut’s seriously damaged dinghy. The one thing nutmeggers may not see in the new year is an attempt to recover from the expected consequences of the new tax reforms through a reduction of state taxes.

Gov. Dannel Malloy, whose approval rating is a few points higher than Hell’s minor devils, will not be with us after the 2018 elections, but he will have left behind, as a memorial of his passing, a load of wreckage. Bets are on whether a gubernatorial library will be erected to preserve Malloy’s destructive tendencies during his two terms in office, including both the largest and the second largest tax increases in state history.

In certain quarters, the leavetaking of the most progressive governor in Connecticut since Wilbur Cross – discounting former Maverick Gov. Lowell Weicker — will be celebrated with a moment of telling silence. Progressivism, which is state-socialism without the gulag, will survive Malloy’s passing, because progressivism always survives.