Local Trivia: We're Democrats first, then environmentalists. But mostly we just want the status quo to stay the same.

Driving through town last week, probably on the Big Lots shopping expedition that had me combing the state for additional seasons of Star Trek Voyager for $10 (they had season 3 at one Big Lots, making me hopeful for more -- alas, as in the series' episodes, my journey brought me to many other items along the way but did not achieve my original goal), I saw a sign that said, simply, "saveprospect.com."

Naturally, since it was past campaign season, I jotted down the web address to look up later. Such simple signs raise my curiosity and make me hope for a crackpot angelfire home page that would have been otherwise unGoogleable.

I didn't find a crackpot angelfire home page -- I'm pretty sure those have all been imploded anyway -- but I was surprised by the site I found. That is, I was surprised by the news that Prospect, CT is considering installing wind turbines (or a wind turbine). I was much, much less surprised that Connecticut residents had formed a committee to stop the turbines from being installed.

Read it for yourself, but the controversy is over the annoying sounds the turbines might make, the fall in property values, and -- most interestingly, I thought -- the wildlife and regulatory issues at stake in putting up a wind turbine in a state that so far has (they seem to claim, though I have no knowledge of this) insufficient regulation re: wind turbines.

Interesting argument on the regional level here, over an issue I thought was restricted to "Cape Wind" controversy (offshore "wind farms), and one that I think perfectly epitomizes how Connecticut and southern New England in general tends to look at things: it appeals at once to the property owner, the environmentalist, and the regulation-happy Democrat. That is a tough tightrope to walk...but it's the Connecticut way. (Note also that ultimately the hoped-for outcome is a conservative one, since it would leave things, at least in Prospect, pretty much the same.)

Unfortunately for all of us, Prospect is on a bunch of high hills and so gets a lot of wind, while Bridgeport, New Britain and Hartford, etc. are pretty much flat -- meaning we can't just move the annoying turbines to lower-class neighborhoods like we might do with other unsightly energy-producing machines or, on occasion, toxic waste.

Which means that probably, instead of wind turbines being installed, we'll end up doing what we tend to do -- being New Englanders -- and change nothing.

That's the true advantage of appealing to the disparate masses: everyone agrees with you, and nothing gets done.