Connecticut's Best and Brightest?

The folks who would like to replace Governor Rell and Senator Dodd in order to change Hartford and Washington DC share a common problem. Each offers some version of "business as usual" to connect his or her opponent to the respective dysfunctional cultures of state and national government and then engages what any voter who can read without moving his or her lips can see as "campaigning as usual."

Each candidate selects from a common menu: quoting opponents out of context, tinting opponents' least flattering photos for an evil, unattractive image (oooh, clever!) sharing partial truths, and making it clear that the opponent engages negative campaigning and tells lies. The Foley and Fedele campaigns are so similar their respective contents could be exchanged and the ads would work—and that’s true of the Molloy and Lamont campaigns as well. Oh, and just when it seemed the McMahon campaign might be refreshingly above the fray, their one-issue postcard attack on someone who’s not officially their opponent yet arrives.

These change agents are homogenous and blind to their homogeneity. Despite superficial differences in content, we can hear the same conventional, two-party, political voice speaking through each of them. They’re doing and saying what candidates always do and say—in the name of change. They may be decent parents and potentially harmless outside of their political ambitions—and apparently good at something that makes them money as well, but if their campaigns do represent them, they are either painfully unaware of the idiocy embodied therein, or they’re aware and are unable, unwilling or unequipped to let that idiocy go. If their campaigns don’t represent them, well, I don’t even know how to finish that thought in a few words.

We’ve needed a “none of the above” selection on the ballot for decades, which allows voters to exercise what is both an obligation and a privilege, while not being reduced to voting for the least dislikeable candidate. The current batch of Connecticut candidates are poster children for that selection. To quote the former First Lady, “Just say no.”