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Making His Mark
The story behind the story of why Shiffrin can't bear breasts
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Business New Haven
10/20/1997
By: Laurence D. Cohen
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State Consumer Protection Commissioner Mark Shiffrin has declared war on bare breasts, in a formal broadside aimed at the gin-joint industry that promises strict enforcement of important legislation mandating flannel nightgowns for strippers who have not received a waiver from the National Endowment for the Arts.
As a consumer protection regulator, Shiffrin would seem to be on the wrong side of this one. The “consumers” are virtually unanimous in their support of naked illegality.
But Shiffrin had every right to get this off his flat chest. He is Sultan of Suds, Boss of Budweiser, Master of Miller; he has swallowed up the Liquor Control Commission, in one of those government reorganizations of years past.
Beyond the liquor industry, the Consumer Protection coup that captured liquor control didn't attract much attention. The state liquor laws are so larded up with anti-consumer gifts to the industry that nothing short of an atom bomb could make a dent.
That's often how it is with bureaucratic reorganizations: The insiders suffer great doses of angst and pain and concern, but when all is said and done, most folks don't care and barely notice the difference.
Large corporations have enriched a generation of consultants with round after round of such stuff. Shall advertising report to marketing; should Investor Relations be moved from Law to Finance? The shuffles go on and on and, when the CEO changes, they do it all over again.
In the public sector, let us all bow our heads and say a little prayer of thanks for the sainted members of every charter revision commission of every little village in Connecticut. Charter revision commission members routinely contemplate mass suicide as they slog through the bureaucratic morass, to the yawns and sighs of the citizenry.
That being said, futility is addictive. The itch to tinker a bit, to shuffle and reshuffle and tweak the organizational beast just a little bit, is almost irresistible.
Now, it is written in Deuteronomy that incumbent politicians in Connecticut are authorized to beat up on utilities during election season, but there was still something heartwarming about the Republican governor and the Democratic attorney general standing as one against nuclear holocaust and nightmarish visions of two-headed kittens at Haddam Neck.
But what is this had been crafted as a partisan issue, with one party jumping to the defense of the utility and the other party embracing an anti-nuke platform? You could have had an agitated client with an unsympathetic lawyer, or an aggressive lawyer with a client who wasn't interested in playing.
That's where the box-shuffling, organization-tweaking itch comes into play. Why do we elect a state attorney general? Why are we comfortable with the notion that being the state's top lawyer is a contest to be won or lost at the ballot box? We elect a governor to be our chief executive officer, but whether his top lawyer is friend or foe is often beyond his power to decide.
The same issue comes to mind with the state treasurer, who in many states is appointed, not elected. In Connecticut, we elect a governor to direct fiscal policy and but he has no authority to pick a guardian for the state pension funds - which in theory could be invested in asparagus futures by a treasurer on the Vegetarian Party line.
At the local level, there's plenty of opportunity to unleash the box-shuffling, reorganizing demons. In Hartford, the city council has become, for all intents and purposes, a non-partisan body, with a few Republicans and common-sense Democrats coming together to create a credible coalition - a coalition that undergoes a nervous breakdown every Election Day when the players are forced to pretend they don't really get along that well. Shall they ponder the notion of non-partisan City Council elections?
Would any of this make much difference? That's part of the fun. You're never quite sure. The old Liquor Control Commission didn't care much about breasts.
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