Yesterday, in a late night session of the legislature campaign finance failed to pass. Both he House and Senate passed monumental campaign finance reform packages – unfortunately there was not enough time to reconcile the differing proposals.

As the Hartford Courant reports, a special session of the legislature may be convened to address the issue of campaign finance reform. I would agree with Tom Swan of CCAG that a cooling off period is in order to help rebuild the coalitions on this important issue who have been concentrating recently on who to blame (see today’s NH Register) rather than on passing this landmark legislation.

Yesterday the Hartford Courant reported that after months of opposition to H6670 Governor Rell is finally ready to make a compromise on campaign finance reform. 

The bill which has become a catch all of finance proposals has received opposition from the governor from the beginning of the session.  Rell who argues that her version of campaign finance reform which would ban contributions from various “special interests” would be true reform to the system – but I beg to differ.

I am appalled on so many levels with this news. First Rell’s original proposal would not fix the problems with money in politics the only way to really fix the problem with the system is to publicly finance elections – the position that she previously opposed.  

By now I'm sure you've heard the news regarding today's sentencing of former Gov. John Rowland. After nearly 2 years of coverage, we certainly don't need to spend too much time here recapping the scandals that plagued the former Governor's administration. Instead, we should borrow from the sentiment that was being expressed by the majority of people who stood outside the courthouse today awaiting the judge's decision — Improve the System.

The people rallying outside were right. Connecticut residents have almost completely lost faith in the nature of our politics and our government (Check out the WTNH Poll). After years of scandals at all levels of government, you can't really blame them. Our state needs corrective action, and we need it soon. And as groups like Common Cause of Connecticut and the Connecticut Citizen Action Group say, the first place to start is with the most corrupting influence in the system, the money.