Joining the GOP on Social Security

By Reginald Johnson    

   President Obama’s comments on Social Security in the presidential debate last week underscore how far right the Democratic Party has drifted, and belie the claim that there is a sharp difference between Obama and his opponent,  Mitt Romney.

    After debate moderator Jim Lehrer asked each candidate to give their views on Social Security, Obama proceeded to say that there wasn’t much difference between his position on the retirement program and Gov. Romney’s. He added that while the program was “structurally sound” there was some need for “tweaking.”

  Oh boy. In the world of Washington, “tweaking” is a euphemism for “cutting.”

 In saying this, Obama has restated his support for the call by the bi-partisan Simpson-Bowles deficit reduction commission, which advocated cost of living adjustment reductions and raising the retirement age in Social Security.

  Romney has also asked that the retirement be raised to 69. Since a lot of folks don’t make it to 69, this is a heartless and effective way of reducing payouts. He’s also called for “means testing,” a system by which so-called higher-income people  (this hasn’t been defined; will higher income mean $100,000, or $60,000?) will have their benefits reduced..

  The point here is, both the Democratic and Republican candidates want to cut Social Security payments,  although workers paid into this system all their adult life.  The candidates’  proposals may differ on how the cuts take place, but the result is the same.

  Obama and Romney also speak the same nonsense about some phantom problem with the financial viability of the program, when there is ample proof that Social Security is in solid shape for years to come.

   So there you have it. Once proposed by a Democratic president (Franklin Roosevelt) as a central part of the New Deal, and fervently backed by a string of Democratic presidents for decades after, a Democratic president today wants to cut Social Security, even there’s no need for doing so.

   The president’s view on Social Security is just one example how the two main parties agree on a number of key issues today. This is not the 1930s of Franklin Roosevelt or the 1960s of Jack Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, or even the 1970s of Jimmy Carter.

    This is 2012 and we have a corporate Democrat in the White House, who takes his cues, like the Republicans do, from Wall Street. The corporate elite want to eliminate all safety net programs, because it guarantees business taxes will be kept low.  It also makes for a more desperate workforce: take the job we offer sucker, because you got nothin’ else.

  On that happy note, I end this blog, urging everyone to consider two third party candidates, Jill Stein of the Green Party or Rocky Anderson of the Justice Party. Both of them are progressive and excellent on a raft of issues. Don’t say a vote for them is pointless, because they have no chance at victory. At least you believe in what you’re voting for.

   A vote for Obama is pointless, because on too many vital issues, he’s no different than Romney. 

Let's have a real debate!

By Reginald Johnson                        

                   Three huge issues have received almost no attention so far in this year's presidential election campaign: global warming, the corporate takeover of election financing and the future of Social Security.

                   I’m hoping the silence around these issues will change in this month’s debates, which begin Wednesday night in Denver.

             The format for the first debate is that Jim Lehrer, of PBS, will ask questions of his choosing about domestic policy. It would be better if there were a team of journalists asking questions, but this is the format. All the other debates will have a similar format, except one which will see citizens ask questions in a town hall setting.

    At tomorrow’s debate it will be up to Lehrer to ask questions of the greatest relevance. Let’s hope he does his job.

           Despite what is being called a “planetary emergency” relating to global warming, President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney haven’t touched the issue of climate change during the campaign. And apparently the elite Washington press corps hasn’t bothered to ask them what their approaches are to dealing with his massive problem, since we haven’t heard anything about it.

       Lehrer needs to ask President Obama why he hasn’t shown more leadership in dealing with climate change during his first term.  While Obama has done a few positive things, such as issuing improved fuel economy standards for cars and setting CO2 standards for cars and new power plants, he has not advocated the kind of sweeping program that’s really needed to slow global warming. He needs to go before the American people and lay out how serious this problem is, and propose a comprehensive plan to turn the nation to a green economy and turn away from fossil fuels. It’s also imperative that he show real leadership on the global level, something he hasn’t done so far.

   Romney needs to be asked how he can be taken seriously as a presidential candidate when he has the audacity to question the reality of global warming. The GOP candidate claims that climate science is “unsettled,” despite the mountain of studies indicating otherwise. He’s come out against a carbon tax and would continue the Republican attack on the EPA for trying to regulate carbon emissions. Lehrer needs to question him on these wholly irresponsible positions.

  Then there’s Social Security.  The two main presidential candidates need to come clean about how they view this long-standing old-age benefit program, which sustains hundreds of millions of people. Up to this point, Obama has played his usual evasive game of ‘I support it, but….’ He set up the Bowles-Simpson deficit reduction commission a couple of years ago that recommended a cut in Social Security cost of living adjustments. Obama said he agreed with the plan. But lately, during the election campaign, Vice President Joe Biden has gone around and stated emphatically that no cuts are planned for Social Security.

   So what are we to think here? If re-elected,  will Obama seek cuts in Social Security or not?  The economist Dean Baker recently wrote a good piece on the conflicting signals coming from the administration on Social Security at www.commondreams.org/view/2012/09/18-2.

  Romney, while he hasn’t said so explicitly, would likely back cuts to Social Security. He and his running mate, Congressman Paul Ryan, support the elimination of Medicare as we know it, turning it into a weakling “voucher” program, in order to reduce costs. If they think this way about Medicare, then you better believe Social Security is in their gunsights as well. Lehrer needs to probe Romney on this issue, especially in the wake of his notorious remark that he didn’t care about the 47 per cent of all Americans who collect some kind of government benefits.

   Finally, there’s the issue of corporate influence in elections and the astronomical cost of running for office. Since the passage of the Citizens United ruling by the Supreme Court, which opened the door to virtually unlimited corporate spending in election campaigns, there’s been an avalanche of business sector money being dumped into Super PACs and independent outside groups to attack or support different candidates. The ruling is giving corporations an inordinate amount of power in determining who will win elections.

  There’s a drive on to pass a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United and reverse the legal position that corporations have the same free speech rights as people, or simply put, that corporations are people.

   Romney already is on record as supporting Citizens United, saying “corporations are people.”  Lehrer or someone at a later debate should ask him how a democracy can last when corporations take over the election process.

   Obama, who has criticized the Citizens United ruling, should be asked whether he backs the proposed constitutional amendment, and if not, what he thinks should be done about the astronomical cost of elections and in particular the massive spending by corporations in elections.

   I don’t know whether any of these questions will be asked, or to what extent. If no questions are asked about these three vital subjects, the whole debate process is a sham.

  If you want to be sure you’ll hear debate on the issues discussed above and more, tune in Wednesday from 8:30 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. to the show Democracy Now (www.democracynow.org)  which is hosting a special debate for two third party candidates, Jill Stein of the Green Party and Rocky Anderson of the Justice Party. The two candidates have been shut out of the main debate by the Commission on Presidential Debates.

  Stein’s campaign also said an “Occupy the CPD” has sprung up and Stein, her running mate Cheri Honkala, supporters and activists will march on the CPD event at the University of Denver, prior to the DN broadcast.

   The media have largely ignored Stein and Anderson’s campaigns. One exception has been the interview of Stein by Scott Harris of the Between the Lines radio show on Aug. 17.  To hear the broadcast go to www.btlonline.org.

  

    

   

Dumbing Down, Chapter 962

By Reginald Johnson


Just when you think the news media can’t get more irresponsible with its focus on the silly and the superficial, it proves you wrong.

On Tuesday, the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11th terror attacks, the NBC Today show decided to present an interview with Kris Jenner, mother of Kim Kardashian --- from the reality show “Keeping up with the Kardashians --- instead of going live to the “moment of silence” at Ground Zero and Washington, D.C. for the nearly 3,000 victims of the tragedy.

The 911 attacks were not only hugely important because of the death and suffering they caused here, but also because 911 set the stage for the war-mongering foreign policy that followed, with the American invasions of both Iraq and Afghanistan and all the massive death and destruction that those wars have caused.

But the people at NBC News don’t get it.  Pop and celebrity news is the order of the day. If they had been doing their job last Tuesday, they would have covered the memorials live, and also did a report on the overall significance of 911.

NBC is not alone, of course, in favoring superficial entertainment news over real news. Other large media operations and newspapers around the country are doing the same thing.

The show “Nightline” from ABC News used to be pretty good, with daily reports on major issues of substance. Occasionally, conservative bias showed up in the reports on foreign policy or domestic issues. But overall, it wasn't a bad show.

The night after the end of the Republican National Convention where presidential candidate Mitt Romney and vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan spoke of their desire for major changes in policies governing such things as health care and taxes, "Nightline" apparently decided it wasn’t worth doing a follow-up. No need to do, say, an analysis of what impact there might be on the American people, should the Republicans win in November.

Instead, this was the lead story on "Nightline": a report on Evelyn Lozada, star of the VHI reality show “Basketball Wives” and her break-up with football star Chad Johnson. The second story on the show was called “Diving with great white sharks.” Need I say more?

So this is what’s become of a once well-regarded news show. Fluff and nonsense. Dumbing down anyone?

The emphasis on entertainment, as opposed to news, is also becoming more pronounced in local newspapers.

In the Sept. 1 issue of the Connecticut Post, just after the GOP convention, the Post’s lead story, splashed on the top of Page 1 was: “Eastwooding’ goes viral.” The lighthearted story reported that there was terrific interest on the Internet in actor Clint Eastwood’s talk with a chair at the just-finished convention. Eastwood had a humorous, though rambling make-believe discussion with President Obama sitting in the chair. Most pundits panned the performance.

The Post reported that “Eastwooding” --- or posing (as if to harangue with a chair) --- “had joined the vernacular and become a social media craze.” Some 80,000 tweets were reported during Eastwood’s performance, the story said.

Also on Page 1, just below the Eastwood story, was a feature on the Hood Blimp. The Hood (as in milk company) Blimp normally flies over Fenway Park in Boston during Red Sox games. Readers were told they might see it flying overhead while they were out and about over the weekend.

OK. Blimps aren’t exactly a common site, so there’s nothing wrong with having a story on the arrival of a blimp. Kind of a cool thing to see.

I really don’t have a problem with either of these stories per se. My beef is with their placement. They lead the paper.

The paper came out just after the convention. You would think it would be useful and important to do a follow on the convention, some kind of political spin-off that would be prominently placed on Page 1. What do people in the area think of Romney after his speech? What do they think of the GOP platform?  What are Romney’s prospects? Anything. After all, this guy could wind up being president, setting in motion policies that will affect all of us.

Or heaven forfend, the Post might do an important local story that would get top billing. The Post is based in a city (Bridgeport) with a high poverty rate, huge educational problems, widespread foreclosures, sky-high tax rates and surging crime. Delving into those issues might yield a story or two. Here's another idea. Find out what the mayor is doing about these problems.  Does anybody know? Does anybody care?

Ah heck, it’s so much easier to run fun stories about blimps and “Eastwooding.” It’s all the craze you know.

Targeting Syria

By Reginald Johnson



 It’s a like bad movie that keeps coming back.

 The first time you saw it, you said, ‘I never want to see this again.’

 But it keeps getting shown because, unfortunately, it’s on the news. You don’t want to watch it, but you’re forced to. And every time, you get the same sick feeling.

 The movie is actually part of a long-running series that might be called “America Makes War on a Bad Country.”

The latest installment is now playing. It’s called “America Makes War on Bad Syria.”

 It is probably number 20 in the movie series involving different nations. Or is it 30, or 40? I’ve lost count.

 In a script similar to the other shows, America says it doesn’t like Syria because its leader, Bashar al-Assad, is bad to his people. His regime has committed human rights violations. Locking up dissenters and allowing torture in his prisons. Indeed, there is independent verification to support this claim.

 Now America --- because its own human rights record is so good (talk to Pakistani or Afghan villagers following bombing attacks, or men waterboarded in U.S. prisons, they’ll tell you) --- feels so strongly about bringing freedom to the Syrian people, that it’s begun an urgent campaign to get rid of the Assad government.

 Through other countries like Saudi Arabia and Turkey, the U.S. is supplying weapons to the rebels in Syria. CIA personnel have been sent to Turkey to train the insurgents, according to the New York Times.

 This indirect, war-by-proxy against a sovereign nation is illegal under international law, because it’s not sanctioned by the UN, and the U.S. has not been attacked by Syria. But who cares about international law? The U.S.A has done this so many time before, hardly anyone blinks an eye.

 Led by their constitutional lawyer and now President, Barack Obama, America is still trying to get some sort of resolution through the UN to authorize a wider military action against Bad Syria, but things are a bit slow because Russia and China, allies of Syria, keep balking.

 While the UN stalls, the U.S. has turned to Old Faithful --- NATO--- to get more pledges of support. Yes, just as Britain and France helped out with the humanitarian bombing campaign against Libya last year, these loyal allies from the days of the Cold War, plus Turkey, have come to the rescue again. Like the U.S., they care deeply about human rights and have the records to prove it --- just ask the Irish and Indians about Britain, or the Algerians about France, or the Kurds or Armenians about Turkey, and they will all sing praises.

 As noted, the freedom-loving monarchy of Saudi Arabia, along with Qatar, have also joined in this noble effort.

 Just call this the “Coalition of the Benevolent to Help Syria!”

 In another echo from previous movies in the series, friendly media outlets in the U.S. have joined in the campaign to justify action against this year’s bad country. CNN has helped by running screaming reports every night, showing footage from opposition cell phone videos showing alleged Syrian government massacres. No real effort has been made to obtain a government response to the claims of indiscriminate violence.

 The movie on Syria is still in progress, and we don’t know for sure how it will end. But there’s a good chance that Assad will suffer the same fate as Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi did last year --- lying in a roadside ditch with an American bullet in his head.

***********************

 OK, let’s turn on the lights, turn off the propaganda that passes for news and take a critical look at the situation in Syria.

 The conflict there has nothing to do with human rights or alleged atrocities by the Assad regime. It has everything to do with a geopolitical power struggle over who controls the oil-rich region of the Middle East.

 Syria is allied with Iran, which sits on the world’s third-largest supply of oil. Through the insurgency it is supporting, the U.S. aims to topple the Assad regime in Syria, get a more friendly group in power, and isolate Iran, which the U.S. has been at odds with for sometime. From the springboard in Syria, the U.S. can more easily bring down the government in Iran, either through constant pressure tactics or direct military action.

 Then the U.S. will have primacy in the Middle East and control over the flow of oil --- the most critical resource in the world, a resource which is getting more scarce by the year.

 This is the game plan.

 But it is game plan fraught with risk.

 Russia and China, which covet oil just as much as we do, are not going to sit idly by while the Americans take control over so much of the planet’s most vital resource.

 That’s why the two countries are resisting strong action on Syria at the UN, and why Russia has been arming Syria.

 It would be potentially catastrophic if the U.S. and its NATO partners unilaterally take military action against Syria.

 Undoubtedly, the U.S. will continue to try to get some sort of UN resolution condemning Syria for human rights abuses together with a provision for limited intervention. That will provide cover for an open, Libya-style attack.

 The Security Council is due to meet Wednesday to discuss Syria, and new allegations of civilian killings by Syrian government forces.

 People need to stand up and speak out about American duplicity in Syria.

 The American press has to do a better job of investigating the truth about allegations of mass killings and brutality by the Syrian government and be more questioning about America’s motives in connection with Syria.

 It is well known and absolutely true that the Syrian regime for a number of years has been committing human rights abuses against its citizens. Assad, like Gaddafi, is a despotic leader. The UN Human Rights Council last fall condemned Syria for a number of abuses. Many Syrian citizens have legitimate grievances against the government.

 It’s also true that the Syrian government military has sometimes been brutal in its effort to quell the rebellion.

 But opposition forces have been guilty of brutality against innocent people as well in a civil conflict which is pitting different sectarian groups against one another.

 Reports of “massacres” by government forces have been exaggerated. In May there were accusations of a slaughter of 100 people by the government in the village of Houla. The opposition group, the U.S. backed Free Syrian Army, repudiated a UN truce plan on the grounds that the government had used the ceasefire to carry out the attack.

 But according to an analysis on Syria in the World Socialist Web Site, the leading German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, reported that “multiple eyewitness accounts of the killings in Houla reported that the massacre was actually carried out by FSA fighters who had targeted minority Shiites, Alawites and Christians who had refused to join the Sunni-based opposition.”

 The German story got no attention in the U.S. press.

 In conclusion, Americans do need to speak about human rights abuses wherever they occur, whether at the hands of our government or at the hands of another. But we cannot allow our government to manipulate democratic uprisings in various countries and pretend we are siding with a certain group to achieve a more humane condition for people, when in fact the goal is far different.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's Victory is Not a Mandate for Anti-Labor and Austerity Agenda

By Reginald Johnson and Anna Manzo

(Originally published June 6, 2012)




“Live to fight another day” – is an old saying, often used in sports.

 Despite conservative and centrist pundits pronouncing Gov. Scott Walker’s victory in the unprecedented recall election a smashing victory over labor and the Democrats, it’s really not. Nearly half of all voters in Wisconsin casting ballots in the special election voted against Walker. That’s not a ringing endorsement for the incumbent, and gives him only a weak mandate, if you can call it a mandate, to proceed with his anti-labor and cost-cutting policies.

 Consider that the Republican’s effort to beat back the recall was aided by a record-breaking infusion of money. Over $63.5 million was spent by all candidates and independent groups; $45.6 million had been spent on Walker's behalf, compared with about $17.9 million for Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, according to the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, a nonpartisan group that tracked spending.

  Walker was able to reap the benefits of 2010's Supreme Court ruling on Citizens United, which allows corporations to donate unlimited campaign funds via super- PACs without public disclosure. Walker had enough money to buy almost every vote in Wisconsin!

 And, he managed to evade recall, despite a two-year "John Doe" corruption investigation into his days as a county executive. Just days before his recall election, he had transferred $100,000 of campaign money to his legal defense fund, seemingly acknowledging that he is the center of the probe, according to the Milwaukee-Wisconsin Sentinel and Salon.com.

 But he got 53 percent of the vote; 46 percent of Wisconsin voters said emphatically they’ve had enough of his retrograde ideas, and want him and his philosophy to go away.

 They’ll keep fighting and this battle is far from over.

 It was heartening to see the enthusiasm and determination with which the recall backers worked this past year. Though the goal was not reached this time, the collective effort on the part of so many provides momentum for future struggles.

 What was disheartening was the anemic support national Democrats, like Barack Obama, gave to the recall effort. (Obama's only public endorsement was an "11th-hour" tweet in support of Walker's opponent, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett.) They should be ashamed. A little more high-profile support from Obama and Vice President Joe Biden – and more money from the Democratic National Committee – and this thing could have been won.

 Progressives keep hoping that Obama will suddenly turn into a fighter and work hard for their causes, but it’s never going to happen. He’s too much of a centrist, business Democrat. He probably silently agrees with Walker and some of his anti-union, austerity-oriented policies.

 Obama doesn't seem to understand how to rekindle his grassroots, populist base of 2008, and it's clear he will have a big fight ahead. Economist Robert Reich notes that financial, retail and oil giants such as JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, WalMart, BP and Chevron, have joined billionaires David and Charles Koch in launching a multi-million dollar TV ad campaign falsely blaming him for the national debt.

 Charles P. Pierce of Esquire magazine warned of a worst-case scenario if Walker prevails:

 "...assuming he doesn't go down in the ongoing John Doe investigation in Milwaukee, I predict that he will have an 'exploratory committee' set up in Iowa within the month, and he will suddenly discover a deeply held desire to spend a lot of time in places like Nashua and Manchester. Make no mistake: If he hangs on, he will be the biggest star in the Republican party."

 Grassroots movements can eventually push the likes of Scott Walker out of the way, but it’s clear they can’t look to most national Democrats for help.

 And it's obvious from the huge influx of campaign funds into this battleground state, the only mandate in this recall election came not from Main Street, but the likes of Wall Street.


Related links:

• "Analysis: Walker's win in Wisconsin boosts conservatives," Chicago Tribune, June 6, 2012

• "The Walker Vote Earthquake," American Spectator, June 7, 2012

• "Walker Survives Wisconsin Recall Vote," New York Times, June 6, 2012

• "10 Numbers You Need to Know on Scott Walker Recall Day," Mother Jones, June 5, 2012

• "A Wisconsin Recall FAQ," The Nation, June 5, 2012

• "What Happens If Scott Walker Wins Is No Good at All," The Politics Blog, Esquire, May 16, 2012

• "Scott Walker’s “John Doe” scandal, explained," Salon.com, June 1, 2012

• "Walker campaign sends $100,000 to John Doe legal fund," Milwaukee-Wisconsin Sentinel, May 29, 2012

• "Republican Super PAC’s Spending Big In 2012," ABC News blog, May 30, 2012

• "Scott Walker Promised $500K Donor He Would 'Divide and Conquer' Unions," The Nation, May11, 2012

• "John Nichols: Walker aligns with nation's top 'union buster'," The CapTimes.com, May 30, 2012

Angry and Fighting Back

The people of Europe are sending a message loud and clear: they’ve had enough of austerity programs that have created widespread misery around the continent.

In elections last week in France, Greece and even Germany, people came out in large numbers and voted overwhelmingly against the political leaders who have been backing the austerity policies.

Nicholas Sarkozy, the conservative president of France, was dumped in favor of Socialist Francois Hollande, marking the first time a socialist had won in France in 30 years. In Greece, the PASOK and New Democratic parties, which had led Greece and backed the austerity programs, were spurned in favor of several fringe leftist parties that opposed austerity. In Germany, voters in the nation’s largest state came out in force to reject Chancellor Angela Merkel’s austerity policies.

Europeans are increasingly fed up with philosophy held by the continent’s pro-business political leaders like Sarkozy and Merkel, as well as top bankers, that in order to save the floundering economies in the European Union, ordinary people must accept sharp cutbacks in pay, pensions and government services.

The austerity policies have led to high rates of joblessness, homelessness and despair in Greece and Spain. Suicides are on the rise.

Amid all this, working people look around, and they don’t see any undue hardship imposed on well-heeled corporations or the rich. Banks and creditors which lent money to national governments, are being asked only to take modest “haircuts” on the money owed them.

Wealthy elites, with their millions, don’t have to worry about layoffs or cuts in government services. It doesn’t matter to them. And they don’t have to worry about kicking in more money to help shore up their national treasuries. Political leaders in their tow aren’t about to ask them to sacrifice.

So regular folk are revolting against this state of affairs, turning out their leaders and demonstrating on a nearly daily basis.

In Greece, which seems to be ground zero for the crisis in Europe, there’s near chaos. Since the May 6 elections, no one has been able to form a coalition government among the various parties that split the vote. The party that got the most votes, SYRIZA, has said they will not go along with any plan to continue austerity. New elections have been set for June.

Meanwhile, leaders of the European Central Bank are threatening that if the Greece doesn’t continue with the austerity plan, further loans to keep the country afloat will be halted.

There is a strong possibility that Greece will go into default, and be forced out of the Euro Zone.

That could in turn lead to other nations, like Spain and Portugal, going into bankruptcy.

World financial leaders predict dire consequences if this chain of events occurs.

But I’m not sure. Don’t we have to reexamine the value of a system that, in difficult times, imposes such mass suffering on people in order to somehow rebuild itself?

The rebellion against the banks and their political allies --- which is really a revolt against capitalism --- is also gathering steam in the United States. The Occupy Wall Street movement is alive and well and continues to grow, as recent May Day protests show.

More news comes out daily about the misconduct and disastrous management decisions made by major financial institutions like JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America.

Recently, it was revealed that JP Morgan had lost anywhere from $2 billion to $4 billion on speculative bets gone bad in its London office. There are rumblings that Bank of America is in serous trouble.

Are big banks going to come pleading to Uncle Sam for more bailouts in the near future? Are we going to hear the mantra “too big to fail” again?

After more bailouts, will Americans be asked, once again, to “tighten our belts?” because “the money just isn’t there” for social services?

More and more people here, as in Europe, are saying the game is up.

Enough!

Commentary

Ignoring the cities


By Reginald Johnson
February 19, 2012



Newspapers like the Connecticut Post and New Haven Register for years have been backing away from covering issues in the cities where they’re based, focusing instead on topics of interest to residents in wealthier suburban enclaves.

The trend has been driven in large part by a business mindset at papers, where newspaper owners have tried to please advertisers, who are trying to attract an “upscale audience” and who really don’t care too much about the less affluent folk residing in urban areas.

The result has been that publications like the Post (based in Bridgeport), the Register and even The Hartford Courant --- once a very strong daily --- have fewer and fewer stories of interest to the urban reader. And even those pieces dealing with a subject of interest that’s important to city residents are often written so that suburban voices are featured, not city people.

This journalistic disrespect for city residents was on display again last week when a major legal settlement between large banks and state and federal officials concerning fraudulent foreclosure practices was announced. The settlement will see $25 billion provided nationwide to many states, including Connecticut, to settle the claims that the banks had illegally handled thousands of foreclosures, through the practice of robo-signing documents.

Connecticut will get $190 million out of the pot, with the money earmarked for helping homeowners win loan modifications and get refinancing to avoid foreclosure.

There’s been some criticism that the agreement will not do that much good for homeowners and the government did too little to punish banks for their wrongful behavior.

Nonetheless the story is of keen interest to hundreds if not thousands of people in Connecticut’s cities, who are struggling to pay their mortgage and in some cases are actually going through foreclosure. In Bridgeport alone, there’s more than 500 people in the foreclosure process. In New Haven and Harftford, there’s hundreds more such cases.

But here’s how the state’s three biggest dailies treated the story. The Post ran stories over two days, prominently featured, with good information. Only one problem, they didn’t interview anyone in Bridgeport. The reporters talked with a nice gentleman from Stratford on his problems trying to negotiate a better loan deal with a bank. His story sounded legitimate. But that was it for homeowner quotes.

Ironically, the Post did quote the city’s senior manager of Office of Grants and Community Development, who said money from the settlement might help homeowners in Bridgeport, which she described as “one of the ‘crisis cities’ in the state with regard to foreclosure.”

So why didn’t the Post get a comment from a foreclosure victim in the ‘crisis city?’

The Hartford Courant ran a decent front-page piece on the settlement and it’s implications, but, like the Post, couldn’t bring itself to get comments from a city resident struggling with bank payments. It really wouldn’t have been hard. Just pick up the phone and call a neighborhood group or even a housing advocate and you could get plenty of names.

Instead the reporter/paper chose to quote a man from Bloomfield, a suburb of Hartford, who’s been fighting with Bank of America to make the terms of his loan more favorable.

If the Post and Courant added voices from their cities to their coverage, they would have made the stories more meaningful for city residents. But these papers don’t seem to care what urban residents feel.

The New Haven Register blew off the bank settlement story altogether, not even bothering to run a wire piece. This is really a disgrace given the potential ramifications of the settlement on residents in New Haven.

It should be noted that two of three papers mentioned ---- the Register and Courant ---- have cut their staff in recent years, citing financial problems.

Despite the cuts, papers like the Register are still able to send people out to cover shootings, court cases or accidents. If you can do that, you can certainly do a local story about a major foreclosure prevention program that could impact hundreds of local residents.

It’s really a question of priorties. It seems that the three papers mentioned so far --- as well as, I’m afraid, many other papers around the country --- prefer to devote their resources to covering crime and disaster, suburban subjects, and superficial celebrity and sports stories, instead of the deeper social, economic and governmental issues affecting people living in cities.

By the way, I should mention I worked for a number of years at the Post and for a short time at the Register as well.

I can say that there are many fine people at both these papers, and left alone, they can do a good job both editing and reporting.

But the priorities set by owners and publishers in recent years --- the direction they’ve set for these publications --- is the real problem.

Ignoring the needs of the center cities is not only a disservice to the people who live there but antithetical to good journalism.