8 January—Connecticut desperately needs to get rid of the Democrat trifecta that’s been driving the state’s small towns and everyone who’s not a current state employee or beneficiary of its absurdly fecund cornucopia of welfare benefits to ruin for longer than anyone cares to remember. Amiable Democrat Gov. Ned Lamont poses as a fiscally moderate and responsible CEO while appeasing—make that sucking up to—the state’s labor unions with the enthusiastic cooperation of his party’s 100-to-49 majority in the House of Representatives and its equally obnoxious 25-to-11 majority in the Senate.

Not content with throwing other people’s money at the voters it needs to keep pigging out at the trough in order to retain its unhealthy, quasi-dictatorial hold on the poor little captive state (even though the Democrat, unionized, and unaffiliated base can pretty well be relied on come hell or high water anyway), the Connecticut Democrat trifecta also has been brazenly centralizing state government, insidiously usurping home-rule authority—traditionally valued especially in small towns—from municipalities in things like education, zoning, and utility siting.

But forget about all its problems. Because Connecticut can proudly proclaim that it’s the Pizza Capital of the United States. At least that’s what a questionable taxpayer-funded PR campaign boasts and what Democrat Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro declared in the Congressional Record in 2024. Of course, Rosa’s declaration—just a declaration, mind you, a mere statement, not a resolution, not voted on—specified New Haven, which she represents, as the pizza capital. But, like it or not, New Haven is in Connecticut.

Monday, Connecticut Republican Chairman Ben Proto made mincemeat of the state’s pizza campaign, summing up, “At the end of the day, Ned Lamont has just lost sight of what’s important to the people of this state.”

So what are Ben and Connecticut Republicans gonna do about it? Well, Ben claims to be a realist and doesn’t expect to flip either house of the General Assembly. But he hopes for “incremental change” by flipping enough seats in each chamber to dissipate the Democrat supermajorities. No direct comment from Ben about flipping Ned Lamont, though.

But the two declared Republican gubernatorial candidates this year, Erin Stewart and Ryan Fazio, hold more promise than the two GOP two-time candidates since 2010, Tom Foley and Bob Stefanowski—even though Tom and Bob didn’t do at all badly.

Foley had the advantage of being pre-Trump in his 2010 and 2014 campaigns. Unfortunately, Stefanowski called Donald Trump’s endorsement in 2018 “pretty cool.” Although he tried to avoid reference to Trump in 2022, the Trump stigmatic redolence was a major factor in dooming poor Bob’s campaign that year.

So in order to stand any chance at all of getting anywhere in Connecticut statewide electoral politics this year, Republican candidates must not just try to avoid talking about Donald Trump but must absolutely, actively, affirmatively, definitely, unequivocally, and without fail repudiate the tyrannical bastard. Sad to say, though, as Connecticut Republicans appear at this writing, it doesn’t look like that’s gonna happen . . .