Rellroaded

Against my better hopes and notwithstanding her Talbotsy clothes and Fairfield matron's mien, I have gradually come to believe that inside M. Jodi Rell beats the heart of a cigar-chomping  hack in a cheap suit.

All of my eventual problems with Rell were presaged when, in a grand flourish, she swept into office announcing a bright new era of ethical probity. The linchpin of that was the installation of a special counsel-to-the-governor on ethics, Rachel Rubin, a lawyer and specialist charged with setting the highest possible standard for the Rell regime.

When Rubin began to note problems with the way things were done  in Rell's office suite, Rell's solution was not to fix the ethical lapses but to get rid of Rubin and then get rid of the position itself.  So much for ethics.

When you zoom out a little, you can see the dotted line that runs from the ugly and alarming retaliation against the DEP officers to Rell's mysterious memory lapses about her involvement with the gift of a vintage Mustang to then-Gov. Rowland to all the little bits of nastiness that have dotted her regime, during and after Rubin's time.

And when something goes wrong on her watch, Rell's position, unfailingly, is that the buck stops pretty much anywhere but here.

Which brings us the the Case of the Purloined Laptop.

There are, actually, two cases.  One involves a laptop stolen from an actual employee of the a state. That machine contains ...well so far we don't know exactly what. One of the problems with a stolen laptop   is that you don't have it anymore, so you can't see what's on it. At minimum,we know it contained names and social security numbers of 106,000 (give or take) people, most of them Connecticut taxpayers but some of them apparently, inexplicably, out-of-staters who have never lived her or or filed here. Hmmm.  Watch this one. My guess is that there are other shoes waiting to drop, more stuff in that laptop than just the SS numbers. (One clue: the state has been extremely cryptic and unforthcoming about the whole mess.) But even if I'm wrong, that's a pretty gigantic lapse. 106,000! And, call me old-fashioned, aren't laptops that go in and out of the office EXACTLY THE WRONG IDEA when it comes to tax return information?  Isn't that eactly the kind of thing that should be kept in the bulding and some kind of anchored location? Once you start loading this stuffon laptops, it's a matter of when, not if, right?

Then came the second case which, conveniently, did not involve anybody in Rell's chain of command.  A consultant (Accenture) working for the state comptroller's office apparently took a computer tape to Ohio, in violation of their arrangement with the Connecticut. (Ohio apparently wanted to follow Connecticut's specs on some kind of state business accounting program, which is an interesting bit of symmetry. Rowlandologists will remember that Connecticut wanted to follow Ohio's specs for a youth prison, which occasioned a special trip to Ohio taken by state officials and only one of the contractors who wanted the bid on the deal, a felllow named Tomasso.)  Anyway, Accenture apparently did what it did without permission.

What got stolen was a computer tape, which can not be accessed without special equipment and expertise.  (The tape was in the car of an intern. I'm told the car was broken into and cleaned out by the thieves, which suggests the tape was not a target.) On the tape were financial records for 58 people and a lot of stuff connected to the way the state does its business  -- payroll, personnel, purchasing, accounting. I'm not saying this is anything to giggle about, but my sense is that the impact of this second case on the taxpayers of Connecticut is a number very close to zero. I think it's a snowflake and the laptop is an iceberg.

Rell's solution was to scream bloody murder about the case that wasn't in any way the fault of her people, despite the fact that it's not, as cases go, the more dire of the two. She has also been accusing the comptroller's office of being unforthcoming. That office was so annoyed -- and rightfully  so -- that Deputy Comptroller Mark Ojakian volunteered to be on my show and answered every question I asked clearly and decisively.  I feel pretty confident that we know what happened in Ohio and what it portends. I feel no such confidence about the Long Island laptop.

The bottom line: I've decided it's worth creating a special tag or category to log all the instances in which Rell and her minions take the low road. Maybe they'll change their crappy ways, and I'll never get to use it again.  That would be fine with me.

Comments

[Maureen]

I know you (Colin) have answered the last idio.. um person's comment.. however I feel compelled to answer it as well. I don't know what Colin's being perfect (or not) has to do with the job the Governor is doing. After all HE did not take on the job as Governor, nor did he claim he was going to clean up the mess Rowland left. I do know however that the Republican's spent a great deal of time jumping all over Clinton over whether he had extramarital sex or not.. seems to me that had nothing whatsoever to do with how he ran the government.. So here Rell is being criticized for not doing a what she said she would (clean up the mess) as Governor instead she adds to it and you take exception to that??? Pretty funny to me. I also find it amusing that you did not defend her specifically against the remarks Colin made.. you only whined that he made them. So I can only surmise that his points are valid and you are just upset because he wrote them. I have to say I am not too pleased with the way she handles (has handled) issues myself. At this time I do not know if I am one of the tax payers who's information is out there but if I am I would really like her to be doing more than saying why oh why did this happen??? She is pitiful and you are a fool.

[Jeff K]

I agree that Rell is detached and reactionary. However, until somebody besides Colin and a few bloggers start calling her on it, she's going to remain at 70% popularity for the foreseeable future. From what I can see, she's similar to Rowland, only she comes across as far more personable to the average person. And,if you're personable and get on the radio & TV to announce a study of the Avon Mountain crash or the theft of a laptop, you sound like you're on top of things to the average person.

[Tom R.]

As one of the many names on the laptop, I was not surprised to find that M. was disappointed that the laptop allowed itself to be stolen. Her basic style of governing is to wallow in the background of any big story, expressing disappointment and dismay that things like that happen. She then announces a committee to study unfortunate events. Always reacting to events, never taking steps to prevent them.

[Jen Cooper]

Based on the published state org charts, It looks like Rell's Dept. of Information Technology has the group that's responsibile for Data Security (IT Security).

I'm assuming this includes policies and procedures on everything from locked data center doors to mainframe passwords. I assume that the state, like any other large organization, classifies data based on sensitivity and proscribes appropriate procedures for storage and retrieval of that data.

But that would be DOIT, not Wyman, I think.
Am I confused?

[Brenda]

Colin,
I'm glad to see that you are so perfect, have you ever thought about the mess Gov. Rell inherited? I think she's done pretty good for the time she's been there, plus the fact, whatever she does propose, we have numerous democrats, (like yourself) that are there to pounce) and she doesn't have a chance to get things off the ground.
I'm glad you think you're so perfect, better look in the mirror, my friend.

COLIN WRITES BACK: You used the perfect trope twice, but you're otherwise rather short of specifics. My argument is that Rell has done startlingly little to clean up that mess. She has appeared lazy and disengaged. The "mess" she inherited three-plus years ago is largely intact because she has failed to roll up her sleeves and undo Rowlandism. She's not new anymore. That excuse won't work. Three years is a long time in office.
I agree, by the way, that the Democrats, especially Amann, have frequently behaved in a juvenile and petulant way, but even the Democratic legislators more inclined toward bipartisan cooperation have been astonished and exasperated by Rell's detachment and lack of follow-through.