While Republican Congressmen from New York and New Jersey were lashing out at fellow Republicans who blocked a long overdue vote on a $60 billion aid package for victims of Hurricane Sandy, they were also revealing a serious Connecticut shortcoming. The state’s Republican Party is such a mess, we don’t have one prominent Republican to lash out at fellow Republicans when the occasion demands it. Sure, Democratic Gov. Dannel Malloy was righteously indignant about the Congressional Republicans’ hardhearted indifference, but Republican Gov. Chris Christie would win the indignation competition hands down when he said, “There’s only one group to blame for the continued suffering of these innocent victims: the House majority and their speaker.” Christie was joined by virtually every Republican member of Congress from New York and New Jersey in bitterly attacking the leadership of their own party:“There was betrayal.”“I can’t imagine that type of disregard, that type of cavalier attitude being shown to any other part of the country.”“Disappointing and disgusting.”“The conduct of the Republican leadership was disgraceful, it was indefensible and it was immoral.” There were, of course, similar comments from Connecticut’s House delegation and the state’s new senior senator with two years’ seniority, Richard Blumenthal, but they came from Democrats. The voices of the angry northeastern Republicans carried the day. They restored the three states to their rightful place in the Union, at least for now, by shaming their colleagues into approving a $9.7 billion down payment three days later. As for the remnants of the Connecticut Republican Party, Chairman Jerry Labriola did speak out — for the other side:“The $60 billion bill is full of wasteful pork spending and should be trimmed down to actual specific disaster aid. Republicans are just trying to be fiscally responsible,” said the chairman, who apparently has never seen a party line he doesn’t like.It’s true this bill, like most, was pork flavored and there were the usual examples of non-related items like $250 million for fisheries in Alaska but Labriola’s “wasteful pork” also included $3 billion for mitigation projects to protect against future storms, $207 million for a damaged VA hospital in Manhattan, $4 million for repairs to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, $41 million to repair eight military bases in the hurricane’s path, including Guantanamo Bay, and $1.1 million to repair national cemeteries.Republicans held up the bill because they wanted a matching amount in spending cuts, something not usually required in emergency bills that are routinely passed in a bipartisan vote within a week or two of a disaster. But as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid noted, in explaining why the Katrina states quickly got $120 billion in aid and Sandy victims are still waiting, “Alabama has two Republican senators, Mississippi has two Republican senators, Texas has two Republican senators, Louisiana has one Republican senator.”The three northeastern states have no Republican senators, and when Connecticut had the extraordinarily rare opportunity to elect one in two consecutive elections, the party of Labriola offered — ta da — Linda McMahon. Twice.One New York congressman reminded everyone the three states send lots more tax money to Washington than they get back, and Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) took note of another source of Republican revenue when he told CNN that anyone in New York or New Jersey who contributes money to House Republicans in the future “should have their heads examined.”Of course, there’s another fine source of Republican campaign funds slightly to the north of the Upper East Side of Manhattan that might need its heads examined too. Greenwich, New Canaan, Darien and Westport raised $1.2 million for the Obama campaign but nearly five times more, $5.4 million, for the forgotten-but-not-gone Mitt Romney. By coincidence, this year marks the 50th anniversary of Barry Goldwater’s famous crack about the perfidy of the liberal east:“Sometimes, I think this country would be better off if we could just cut off the eastern seaboard and let it float out to sea.” And I always thought he was kidding. Simsbury resident Dick Ahles is a retired journalist. Email him at dahles@hotmail.com.
Latest News
Greg Fricke and James Boehmer, co-owners of Peggy Mercury in Kent, recently launched their first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts.”
Provided
Fricke and Boehmer are not there to stock their shelves with the same products customers find at standard makeup retailers. They’re there to help customers find what works for them. That usually means asking customers about themselves and learning about their beauty habits, skin, style and the way they like to present themselves. Fricke and Boehmer believe it’s their job to help customers bring out the qualities that suit them and determine what works best for their look.
So much of the Peggy Mercury world is about emboldening people to become more creative, and possibly bolder, versions of themselves. Some of this comes through the store’s creative collaborations with artists, designers and stylists.
It’s part of an ethos that encourages them and their friends to use the shop as a kind of laboratory, trying out new creative experiments without knowing how they might turn out. Whether in fashion, painting, fiber arts or photography, the projects almost always turn out marvelously.
A line of sterling silver charms they sell started as a small project by their friend Nolan Percival. In the beginning, the pieces were for close friends and loved ones. But Boehmer and Fricke encouraged Percival to get a little more serious about the project and create a whole line for the store. Today, it’s one of their top-selling collections.
Classic styles, bold colors, and creative concerts make up the “Imaginary Concerts” line at Peggy Mercury.Provided
“Imaginary Concerts” has the duo taking their own advice.
The project started as a way for Boehmer to connect with his mother, who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Taking old concert shirts from his own collection, Boehmer and his mother began cutting out the graphics with the idea that they would make a quilt together. Unfortunately, she died before they could complete the project in 2025. The pieces, which were ready for production, were put on the back burner as Boehmer and Fricke dealt with their loss and the whirlwind of projects that never seemed to cease at Peggy Mercury.
But the harsh winter of 2026 presented an opportunity to take some time and focus on themselves. Part of that meant revisiting and redefining the concert T-shirt project. This time, instead of looking to the warmth and comfort of a quilt, they turned to another passion — fashion.
Taking a page from their own book, they wanted to create something that felt comfortable to them. They took two disparate loves — one rooted in simple preppy style, with clean lines and classic silhouettes, and the other in the nitty gritty worlds of punk rock and pop — and blended them together to create something entirely new. Pulling from the staples of vintage Brooks Brothers and Charvet collections, they applied the graphic elements with bold stitching reminiscent of punk jackets of the ‘70s and ‘80s, but with a much more sophisticated air.
But the remixing isn’t just the pairing of prep and punk. The pieces are not canon. They take liberties with the realities of concert tours, combining one band’s dates with another band’s logos, mixing them all up until the reality is lost and imagination is the only truth.
Shirts from Peggy Mercury’s first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts,” hang on display.Provided
Adding to the mix is an element of perpetual creativity. Art can be messy, both figuratively and literally, and many of Fricke and Boehmer’s artist friends carry evidence of their work on them at all times. As a nod to these tireless creatives, the duo added haphazard splashes of bright color, giving the line an even more distinctive feel.
For them, “Imaginary Concerts” passes the “Peggy Test.” The mythical Peggy Mercury is a fictional figurehead for the company, a character who thrives on creativity and change. The name, much like the clothing line, is a mixture of interests: Mercury is a planet, a deity and an elusive, transformative element, while Peggy is the wonderfully stylish and boundary-pushing Peggy Guggenheim.
Everything Fricke and Boehmer put in their store has to pass this test: Would Peggy Mercury approve? For their first collection, the answer is a resounding yes.
Peggy Mercury is at 9 Maple St., Unit 2, Kent.
Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.
