Chris Powell: Misappropriating flagpoles for proselytizing

The “Christian flag’’ at issue

A “Rainbow” or “Pride’’ flag promoting LGBT interests

MANCHESTER, Conn.

Misappropriation of government flagpoles for political purposes continues in Connecticut. Torrington Mayor Elinor C. Carbone has approved a request to fly a Christian flag at City Hall for two weeks. It's part of a national campaign to urge people to go to church, particularly Christian churches.

This has commandeered the government for religious proselytizing, the sort of thing done in medievally totalitarian countries. 

Of course, most recent flag controversies in Connecticut have involved commandeering the government to celebrate certain sexual orientations, as if sexual orientation isn't as much a personal matter as religion and as if Connecticut law doesn't already guarantee freedom of sexual orientation as well as religion.

Such use of government flagpoles is said to advance "inclusiveness" but it is actually divisive. Not everyone is Christian and no one needs to be told by government to go to church. Such an intrusion into personal matters is offensive. 

As for the sexual-orientation flags -- “pride” flags -- their advocacy extends far beyond equal rights. They are construed to support transgenderism and the overthrow of gender privacy in bathrooms and equal opportunity for women in competitive sports. Most people oppose those things. 

Additionally, as Torrington and many other municipal governments should know, courts have ruled that if government allows outside groups to use its flagpoles, it may not discriminate. If a government grants one request, it must grant all requests, as any refusal is unconstitutional censorship. This is how manger displays on town greens and public parks at Christmastime have compelled acceptance of atheist displays.

What will happen when someone wants to fly a Ku Klux Klan or a Nazi flag at City Hall, or flags advertising car dealers, supermarkets, or political candidates? The Trump 2024 flags are ready to go.

The only flags that can be "inclusive" on government flagpoles are government's own -- flags that fly for everybody.

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Also being misappropriated in Connecticut are the electricity rates charged by utility companies.

At the direction of the state Public Utilities Regulatory Authority, the state's two major electricity distributors -- Eversource and United Illuminating -- are offering discounts to poor customers who are receiving financial support from state government like Medicaid insurance and food subsidies. 

Norwich Public Utilities, the electric company owned by that city, is considering its own program of discounted rates for poor customers, the discounts to be determined according to household size and income.

Such discounts will be financed by customers who don't get discounts. 

The intent here isn't necessarily objectionable but the method is. For these discounts will be public welfare expenses and as such they should be borne plainly through general taxation, not hidden in the bills of other electricity customers.

Already 15 to 20 percent of the charges to electricity customers in Connecticut arise not from the cost of providing electric power but from various social programs and policies state government has decided to finance through electricity bills so resentment will fall on the utility companies rather than elected officials. Connecticut faces nearly the highest electricity costs in the country in large part because state government hides so much of its own costs in electricity bills.

This doesn't mean that electric utilities shouldn't economize. It means that elected officials are grossly hypocritical when they accuse the utilities of overcharging even as state government does more overcharging for electricity than the utility companies do.

PICKLEBALL TAKES PRIORITY: Amid brazen crime and worsening poverty, mental illness, drug addiction and homelessness, Connecticut seems to be falling apart, as does the country itself. But last week Gov. Ned Lamont took a break from those problems to help open the four new pickleball courts in Glastonbury.

The courts were financed with state and federal money, as well as municipal money. Glastonbury, prosperous and well-insulated from social problems by its zoning regulations, could have covered the whole cost itself, without state and federal aid, if the courts were really essential to the town's well-being. But setting humane and sensible priorities in government can be such a drag.

Chris Powell has written about Connecticut government and politics for many years. (CPowell@cox.net)