The Day Dumps Prague

In a slightly startling turn, the New London Day has come to its senses and has endorsed challenger Sean Sullivan in the 19th State Senate District over the 213-year incumbent, Edith Prague.

Perhaps the most meaningful passage in the endorsement of Sullivan is the following, which neatly sums up the problem with electing any incumbent Democrat in Hartford, not just Prague:

They are not only on different political planets - they're in different galaxies.  And right now, Connecticut needs a new galaxy, a new collection of lawmakers in Hartford willing to make the difficult decisions. The legislature must address the budget deficit. It must streamline government. Only by repairing its own fiscal problems can the state again make Connecticut more attractive to businesses and desirable and affordable for its young people.

Prague, a ghast of a liberal who held a seat in the Connecticut General Assembly since it was known as the General Corte, is without doubt a central figure in the financial disaster the state now finds itself.

She was a central figure in the unification of the Hartford, Windsor and Wethersfield colonies that created Connecticut, and was known to clash often with Governor Gurdon Saltonstall on the goat tax.  But her antiquated, moldy, yellowed and parched approach to government is ill-suited to the current times and the current crisis, which she does not appear to comprehend.

It is time to turn this seat over to someone who is not old enough to remember the lightning storm that splintered the Charter Oak.  It's time to brig in fresh ideas, and whisk the odor of mothballs and BenGay from the Senate Chamber.

You're fired Edith!  Take your spittoon and your curious movable-type machine with you.