Handley's happy face; good times for turtles

From the latest elaborate constituent brochure by state Sen. Mary Ann Handley (D-Manchester) published and distributed at state expense, there is this:

“In September the General Assembly and Gov. Rell agreed on a budget for the next two years. The compromise budget includes more than $3 billion in spending cuts — the largest reduction in state history. We did it by cutting costs in every agency and all parts of government. At the same time we were able to protect middle-class families, the elderly, children, and the poor from devastating cuts to critical services.... The budget will help stabilize Connecticut’s economy and help families survive this difficult time.�

In fact, the new budget  raises spending by nearly $500 million; the “cutsâ€� were only in requests for increases. Indeed, the budget really isn’t a budget at all, just a collection of grossly overstated revenue and savings estimates that already have produced a huge deficit, a deficit that could reach 20 percent of appropriations in two years. This deficit will require huge spending cuts or tax increases or both. Despite the happy face Handley’s brochure would put on this desperate situation, nobody has been “protectedâ€� and nothing has been “stabilized.â€� State government has just abdicated. Nobody’s home.

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Many people are “cafeteria Catholics,� Catholic more by family tradition than sincere belief. They choose the church teachings they follow and violate others, particularly in regard to sexuality and abortion. They escape the church hierarchy’s censure because they don’t flaunt their disregard, and so they come to think that the teachings they reject don’t mean much to the church.

But like many other nominally Catholic politicians, Rhode Island U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy has been flaunting his disregard, particularly with his support of legalized abortion, and now the state has a Catholic bishop, Thomas Tobin, who insists that the entirety of church teachings does mean something and that Kennedy can’t be part of the church and shouldn’t receive the sacrament of Communion while he flaunts his disagreement through public statements and votes in Congress.

“That I disagree with the hierarchy of the church on some issues,� Kennedy wrote to the bishop, “does not make me any less of a Catholic.�

Oh, yes, it does — and Kennedy’s comment shows he should know better, since he would belong to a hierarchical church, a church that is emphatically not a democracy but an organization that means to sustain a particular system of belief.

This controversy is not really a matter of the church’s telling an elected official how to vote, though the church does that as much as any other interest group does. No, this controversy is a matter of the church telling a very public person what it requires for church membership. In effect, Bishop Tobin has declared that church membership is not a mere political tool, to be used to when it might win popularity and to be discarded when it might risk unpopularity.

Millions of people have an arrangement with the Catholic Church — they don’t pretend to be Catholic and the church doesn’t accuse them of hypocrisy or political opportunism. Like those other people, Kennedy remains free to vote however he wishes, just not as free to be all things to all people.

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Times are hard in Connecticut, but the Danbury News-Times reports that it’s a good time to be a box turtle, Eastern hog-nosed snake or slimy salamander. For at a cost of $1 million the state Transportation Department has completed a special culvert under the Route 7 bypass in Brookfield so these “environmentally sensitive� species can move from their winter to summer habitats without having to risk getting flattened by highway traffic.

But these are not good times for people to be down on their luck in Connecticut. It was bad enough when homelessness was largely a matter of mental illness and drug addiction. But now even sane and able-bodied people who have lost jobs and have no savings are being pushed into the street. The other day it was estimated that among Connecticut’s homeless are 800 military veterans.

Connecticut knows what has the best chance of rehabilitating the homeless. It’s called supportive housing — modest, government-subsidized apartments with medical and social work staff on site or nearby. But even before the economy collapsed state government had little money for supportive housing, and now there’s hardly any — just another culvert for the troubled to sleep in. At least the turtles probably won’t mind sharing.

Chris Powell is managing editor of the Journal Inquirer in Manchester, Conn.