Gubernatorial hopeful Susan Bysiewicz has complained in this contest, her eighth campaign for statewide office, that Democratic rival Ned Lamont is spending his own money on his campaign. Bysiewicz’s mewling may be rooted in her knowledge of how effective hefty infusions of a candidate’s cash can be. In 1998, the Middletown Democrat put $88,000 of her own money into her campaign for secretary of the state against party endorsed opponent Ellen Scalletar as they neared their September primary showdown. Veterans recall the competition as among them most contentious in modern Connecticut primary politics.

Twenty years ago, before taxpayers began picking up the tab, $88,000 was a lot of money in a low-turnout underticket primary race.

Did they or didn’t they? The Redding RTC did a curious thing Monday. Its members went into an executive session to vote on candidate endorsements. The results are being kept secret.

Redding, readers may recall, is the hometown of attorney general hopeful John Shaban. It would be a logical place for the former state representative to have snagged and celebrated an early, unanimous endorsement from those who know him best. Shaban has been in the contest since late 2017.

Daily Ructions has not been able to confirm the result of last night’s vote but understands it was tight contest between Shaban and rival Susan Hatfield, a Pomfret Republican.

Update: The committee, Daily Ructions has learned, voted 9-9 on the AG race. The town’s four delegates, including Shaban, will go to him. The damage beyond Redding to the 2016 congressional candidate may be difficult to calculate.

You’d think a Lieberman loyalist and former top aide to Eddie Perez would have a thicker skin. Democrat Matthew Hennessy is in a twist over criticism of his Tremont poll released Monday) by my Courant colleague Colin McEnroe. Hennessy texted CTCapitolReport.com  founder and operator Tom Dudchik his opinion of McEnroe’s Facebook post, which you can read here.

The bullying Hennessy text is posted above. What a lot of hooey in the Constitution State.

Watch for a stunner as the Bridgeport casino starts to light up the state Senate in its waning hours. MGM and its allies are on the verge of snagging that prisoner of conscience, state Senator Paul Doyle (D-Wethersfield).

Doyle is a candidate for the Democratic nominations for attorney general. Nearly 100 delegates from Bridgeport would guarantee Doyle, who cast a critical vote against the Democratic state budget last year, a spot on the August primary ballot.

Groceries? No, delegates are driving the casino battle tonight.

The Supreme Court of Connecticut will at last release its decision in the Michael Skakel murder case. Skakel, who has suffered a long series of legal setbacks, has been free during an prolonged delay in a motion to reconsider a decision that went against him at the high court. The nephew of Ethel Kennedy has been free while the matter has been pending, pending, and pending some more for more than a year. The delay has been astonishing, leading observers to speculate that Skakel’s determined partisans on and at the court have been manipulating events until they can get the vote they want.

We will know soon.

Spare a thought today for the late Martha Moxley and her devoted family.

State Senator Mae Flexer reminds us that the most curious things happen in the middle of the night at the State Capitol complex. Flexer has been leading the #MeToo movement to confront sexual misbehavior, particularly in government. The Killingly Democrat surprised colleagues and others during an overnight session early Friday morning when she opposed an amendment by state Senator Art Linares (R-Westbrook) that would allow the attorney general to apply to revoke the pension of a state employee who is convicted of first degree sexual assault or aggravated sexual assault that was committed “while such person was a state public official or was on duty in his or her position as a state employee.”

The Linares amendment passed on a bipartisan 30-6 vote, with the opposition coming from Flexer and five other Democrats.

This is a test for many legislators, none more than state Representative William Tong (D-Stamford), who hopes to win the Democratic nomination for attorney general later this month.

Give Judge Jane Emons a vote. She has been the target of chilling anti-Semitic slurs that may keep her from winning re-confirmation. This is no time for silence.

Toni Harp, New Haven’s popular mayor, will endorse wealthy Greenwich Democrat Ned Lamont for governor on Thursday, Daily Ructions can report. The move should be accompanied by a significant chunk of votes from the biggest delegation to the party nominating convention later this month.

The Harp move will be another blow to Lamont rival Susan Bysiewicz. The Middletown Democrat and former secretary of the state has seen her promising third bid for governor stall as delegates and donors have been thin on the ground in her eighth campaign for statewide office.

Watch for a stampede to begin today in Waterbury. Read more about 2016 National Teacher of the Year Jahana Hayes here. All but a handful of Democrats are delighted. This will stop talk of an Esty resurrection.

Volatile Tim Herbst has an unsettling taste for violent imagery. The Trumbull Republican texted a message to a fellow Republican declaring, “I would love to put my cigar out in Mark Lauretti’s eye”.

In 2016, Herbst sent a text to troubled Enfield Democrat David Alexander that featured a clip with the “make my day” moment from 1983’s “Dirty Harry”, which features star Clint Eastwood pointing a gun. Herbst claimed at the time that he’d sent the clip to Alexander by mistake.

The former Trumbull first selectman’ s violent animus for Lauretti, mayor of a nearby Shelton, seems strange even in the context of the odd Herbst. They are rivals in the crowded contest for the Republican nomination for governor but it’s hard to think of one other than Herbst who would form that cigar assault thought and put it into a text.

The Herbst campaign attributes the text to the campaign’s “desperation season.” Republican delegates, however, will have to wonder what else from Herbst’s cellphone is out there and how many May to November surprises could their party endure.