All Politics is Local

In the last Presidential election, I was recruited to use my election law background to help try to keep the election honest in Philadelphia. Even though I was a veteran of defending against Election Day fraud in places in New York, nothing prepared me for the blatant transgressions I saw in the City of Brotherly Love. The antics of the O’Connell-Corning machine in Albany, where I cut my teeth as an election lawyer in training, the scores of fraudulent ballots I successfully challenged as chair of the Republican Party in New Rochelle, the Brooklyn shenanigans I witnessed in the late 70’s, and the statewide impounding of suspect voting machines in New York, which I initiated, paled in comparison to what I saw four years ago. So when I was given the opportunity by the McCain-Palin campaign to play an Election Day role in the battle ground state of Pennsylvania this year, I thought long and hard. It would be a chance possibly to have a role (albeit a bit player) in an historical event. In the final analysis though, it made more sense for me to remain home on Election Day, to be there – win or lose – for a man that has been there so often for so many people, Fred Camillo. I have known Fred for quite a few years. Fred coaxed me out of political retirement to get involved locally. Fred has gotten many people involved in civics – especially young people. Here is what my son wrote to the local papers about Fred: “Every campaign season, the values of voters become very clear. Almost no one agrees on every issue with either candidate, so candidates appeal to voters by selling themselves as trustworthy, genuine, patriotic, and the ally to the ‘little guy.’. People want elected officials they can relate to and can trust. As far as I am concerned, no candidate for any office fits this description as well as Fred Camillo, the Republican candidate for State Representative. “The first time I met Fred, I was about 12, playing Bambino League Baseball in town; Fred was the umpire. After the game, my Dad introduced me to Fred and when I mentioned that I was interested in politics, Fred invited me to start coming with my Dad to the Republican Town Meeting. Though he was busy at these meetings, Fred never forgot I was there and would always take a moment to come say hi to me and answer any questions I had—he was never too busy for the little guy (me). “In the years since meeting Fred, I've found that he hasn't really changed much. He's still a trusted family friend whom I admire greatly. It seems that Fred's character has never changed; people that have been Fred's friends since he was little say he's always been the honest, hardworking, genuine guy he is now. “When the Wiffle ball controversy erupted this past summer, Fred was working to keep the field standing before my family could even get him on the phone to ask what his opinion was (once again standing up for the little guy). Fred knows what he stands for, will say it, stand by it and act on it before most other politicians even formulate their ambiguous and equivocal responses to tough questions. Just like Fred always called a fair game as a town umpire, I am certain he will always do the right thing at his new job in Hartford if he is elected.” Moreover, Fred is so much more than a “nice guy” and “guy who cares.” I have been impressed at Fred’s deep knowledge of the issues facing our state and town. Fred is knowledgeable and has creative solutions – all with the best interest of Greenwich at heart. Here is what the Greenwich Post wrote in their Oct. 30, 2008 endorsement: “Mr. Camillo has proven himself a formidable opponent this election season…creative ideas that are also fiscally responsible. This is crucial during an economic downturn.” And the Greenwich Citizen, too, endorsed Fred. Saying: “Fred is committed to putting partisan politics aside and working with the Democratic Majority in the General Assembly for the betterment of Greenwich.” The Greenwich Time spoke highly of Fred in their non-endorsement saying he “has the ability, experience and commitment to represent the 151st in an exemplary manner.” This is a bad year for Republicans. In my opinion, it will be a bad couple of years for Greenwich if we don’t send Fred Camillo to Hartford to represent our Greenwich. My son, who is attending school in Virginia, was advised that he too could have more of an impact on the national election by re-registering in Virginia, another “swing state” and voting in the Presidential election there. He chose not to, because Greenwich is his true home, and is where his heart is. He concluded that it was more important to vote for Fred who will look out for the town’s best interests. So, we will be there for Fred on Election Day -- because in the end all politics is local.

Silvio the Plumber

The column below appeared in the October 29th (2008) edition of the Greenwich Time and the Advocate (Stamford, CT) but is not yet on their websites . Long before Joe the Plumber was on the political scene, there was Silvio the Plumber, and were he alive he would be voting for Obama. (And if half of the ACORN voter registration fraud stories are true, he very well may be!) Silvio the Plumber is the first character a reader meets in the 1996 Pulitzer Prize finalist non-fiction The Inheritance: How Three Families and the American Political Majority Moved from Left to Right by New York Times columnist Samuel G. Freedman. (Simon & Schuster). The book traces the evolution of that group of Catholic ethnics the pundits called Reagan Democrats through the stories of three families over the course of three generations. In it we are introduced to Silvio in his pre-plumber days, in 1918, when at the age of 15 he had to drop out of school to help support the family who had taken him in. Silvio’s father, owner of a construction company, had committed suicide years before, when in the wake of the economic panic of 1907, he lost his youngest son, his life savings and his house. The final straw was being unable to meet payroll. By the time of the Great Depression, Silvio himself was a father of two of the four children he eventually had. His daughter, Lorraine, the second child, was born just months before “the Crash.” The depression notwithstanding, Silvio eschewed welfare (which he called “relief”) for his family, even when the power company turned off his lights for non-payment. Silvio believed relief was for those less able-bodied than he. For his part, WPA, the “workfare” of his day, was Silvio’s answer. While “workfare” may be a Republican concept, Silvio the Plumber was not a Republican. He was a proud life-long New Dealer, a union leader for whom the local union hall was named, and a man who could count on one finger the number of Republicans he voted for. Not so, Lorraine. As his daughter Lorraine the Telephone Operator, became Lorraine the Wife and Working-Mother, the Democrat (as she called it) party was changing too. It was no longer the party who had her loyalty in her youth. As was oft-said in the late sixties “she did not leave the Democratic party, the party left her.” Lorraine was part of the first wave of what was to be called the Reagan Democrats. Worse yet in the eyes of Silvio the Plumber, Lorraine’s first-born was a young non-com in the Reagan Revolutionary militia – a Republican enlistee. So, what would Silvio the Plumber say about the 2008 Presidential election? He would probably tell his grandson, “Your party blew it. They came into power with promises of term limits, and family values, of smaller government and less spending. They got drunk on the power – and they spent like drunks. They grew the government, and grew in their conceit. They believed the country needed them to stay beyond limited terms. And now they are paying the price.” And I would reply, “Grandpa, you’re right. My party lost our Reagan roots, and thus the Reagan Democrats. But if your party wins and then deludes itself into believing they have a mandate for their extreme left agenda, the Obama revolution won’t last more than two years. With an extremist agenda he will not unite.” My grandfather, Silvio the Plumber, would say something to the effect that “Frankie, look at all the money wasted on your education and you still don’t know what you are talking about.” I would then say, “Grandpa, you’ve got it wrong. John McCain has it right when he says, ‘Obama’s tax plan would convert the IRS into a giant welfare agency.’ As he told Joe the Plumber, he wants to spread our wealth around. He wants to raise taxes on some in order to give checks to others. Look, I know how you refused relief, and you and I both understand that we must help people in need. But Barack the Wealth-Spreader’s way of doing it is wrong.” “Look, Joe the Plumber isn’t even a union member,” Silvio the Plumber, union leader, would snap. “You’re ignoring the issue, Grandpa.” Frank the Reaganite would reply. “‘Spreading the wealth around’ is like telling one of your great-grandchildren they need to go Trick-or-Treating next week, and then give half of the candy they work to get, to kids who didn’t bother to ring doorbells on Halloween.” “Is that all you Republicans care about? Taxes?” Silvio would retort. “No Grandpa, look at Obama’s pro-abortion position.” “You mean pro-choice.” “No, pro-abortion. As my friend, Princeton Professor Robby George says, ‘Barack Obama is the most extreme pro-abortion candidate ever to seek the office of President of the United States. He is the most extreme pro-abortion member of the United States Senate. Indeed, he is the most extreme pro-abortion legislator ever to serve in either house of the United States Congress.’ “Robby the Professor goes on to explain that Obama isn’t pro-choice. He is Barack the pro-abortionist. He does not want me or my wife, Suzi, to choose not to fund abortions. And Grandpa, if his plans are adopted Suzi, the Nurse-Midwife, might not be able to object to aiding abortion procedures. What kind of choice is that? Come on, I’ll show you how to get to Professor George’s column in the Internet.” Silvio the Plumber would wave off any attempt by me to get him NEAR a computer. So, I would have to use my oral skills. “And you know how Obama has voted on stem-cell research? He votes for money to experiment on human embryos, but AGAINST funding non-embryo stem-cell research! Where is the logic in that? He wants to use my tax dollars to kill what I believe is a human but won’t let my tax dollars be used to research a non-human alternative that has shown so much promise. “I’m telling you, Grandpa, Obama is EXTREME. My cousins, your grandkids in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Ohio and their neighbors are not extremists. IF they vote for Obama, (and I know some of them aren’t) they are not endorsing an extremist agenda. They are not voting for Barack the Extremist. And if Obama’s ego leads him to believe otherwise, his ‘mandate’ will evaporate as quickly as it condenses.” Silvio the Plumber, my grandfather, would probably groan, shake his head in disgust and walk away — sometime later thinking “Damn kid could be right.” But, he would (regrettably) vote for Obama.

The Penultimate Word

While it would have been ideal if all three Greenwich papers endorsed my favorite local candidate, Fred Camillo, I got the next best thing. The one paper which did not endorse Fred fully, gave me and a few others enough time to have published in their paper rebuttals to their editorial. As a partisan I was pleased at the tactical advantage we have, because our opponent’s supporters are not able to rebut the pro-Fred editorials. But having been on the receiving end, I know the other camp’s frustration. Last minute editorial endorsements have been a peeve of mine for years now. Indeed this year, early in the election season I dropped the editors an email urging them to endorse BEFORE their cut-off for readers’ letters in response. I contend it is the right thing to do. In the past the editors have contended “we are understaffed” which holds water this year for the local daily where corporate cuts have resulted in two people handling all editorials and letters for three cities. But the weeklies are covering only Greenwich, where the contested races were few this year. Then there is the claim that scheduling so many candidate interviews is a logistical nightmare. Maybe that was true in years past, but this year there were only three contested races in Greenwich. I find it hard to accept that the papers couldn’t schedule six editorial board meetings with sufficient time to publish their endorsement with even a small window for rebuttal. The argument is also made that the papers wait until the very end to gain as much knowledge about the candidates as possible. Yet, an estimated 13 million people in the nation have already cast early ballots. Locally hundreds of people have voted already by absentee ballot. Those voters had enough information to make a choice. Perhaps the papers believe those voters’ decisions are not fully informed (in which case the papers should oppose early voting), or perhaps they believe those early voters don’t deserve the benefit of knowing a newspaper’s stance on the election before casting their early ballot. Could it possibly be that the newspapers wait until the last minute because they are not satisfied with having only the penultimate word — settling for nothing less than the last word? That is something readers of this blog don’t have to worry about. With the ability for readers to instantly post a comment to a blog, in our case the last word is not monopolized by the media. This is another reason that newspapers may be the wave of the past.

"Senator Obama, are you made at me" -- PART 2

Apparently Senator Obama’s campaign staff didn’t hear it correctly the candidate’s promise to “make America united.” They must have thought he said make reporters from newspapers that don’t endorse Obama fly American or United. The Obama campaign has booted from their campaign plane reporters from three newspapers. Not removed were some people making a documentary (not on news deadlines) and reporters from Ebony and Jet. The booted reporters were from the Washington Times, New York Post and Dallas Morning News, all of which endorsed McCain for President. (Coincidence?) It is important to note that those removed were reporters – not columnists. The distinction is that a columnist is an opinion writer and a reporter is supposed to write facts. Earlier in the campaign Joe Klein, a Time magazine columnist, and Maureen Dowd, a New York Times columnist, both critical of McCain, were barred from the McCain plane. The New York Times and Time reporters were not. Is this the latest episode of Obama staff retaliation? Some in the media seem to think so. In an earlier post “Senator Obama, are you mad at me?” I commented on what I thought was a ham-handed over-reaction by Team Obama to what some claim was partisan questioning by a veteran reporter at Florida’s WFTV by barring the entire station from future interviews of top Obama personalities. I was even ready to give Obama the benefit of the doubt and assume that the Director of Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, Helen Jones-Kelley (who maxed out on contributions to the Obama campaign), was being an overly zealous Obama advocate on her own when she ordered her staff to investigate whether Joe the Plumber was behind in child support or was on welfare. Why try to dig-up “dirt” on Joe whose only offense was asking a question to which Senator Obama gave what some think was an embarrassing (but honest) response – spread the wealth around? The only plausible explanation is to attempt to discredit Joe. This latest episode causes me to think more skeptically about the Obama campaign, if not the candidate himself. There is a troubling trend emerging — one of intolerance and revenge. As an American I hope that it is not Senator Obama, but his staff with the thin-skin and a propensity for vindictiveness. A thin-skinned president will not unite.

Putting your prayers where your vote is.

Drafted into the Catholic Church at birth, I attended “boot camp” for a dozen years of parochial school, considered “officer candidate school” (i.e., a religious vocation), and after a time being AWOL, going on active duty on a daily basis about my faith around age 30. Over the decades since, I have heard a few pro-life homilies – in truth far fewer than should have been preached because, at least in this part of the world, controversial topics apparently do not make for good “box office” receipts in the collection basket. Sure, in the past couple of elections there have been a few voices from the pulpit reminding the faithful to vote for candidates (never mentioned by name, as a matter of law) who stand with the Catholic church’s pro-life, pro-family, pro-poor, pro-social justice teachings. But during the rest of the year, it seems as if many priests are concerned about upsetting some in the pews with sermons against the sins inherent in abortion, contraception, euthanasia and human-embryo research. So often there are either cloaked references, or worse sometimes sinful silence. While there are probably several churches which are exceptions to this “politically correct” culture, one church in the neighborhood is taking it a step further. At 7:30 p.m., on election eve, St. John the Evangelist in Stamford (279 Atlantic St., next to the Rich Forum) is holding a rosary vigil to Our Lady of Victory for the success of pro-life candidates. This is not surprising for St. John’s, where the priests have never been bashful about preaching the truth about the church’s teaching in an unguarded full-throated voice, 365 days a year. This parish prays for victory against terrorists, has courses in “natural family planning,” and is so dedicated to the sacraments that it even offers confessions on Sundays – probably the only church in the State to do so. And now, it is a parish which is putting its prayers where its votes are.

"Senator Obama, are you mad at me?"

Saturday Night Live has become a fixture in the 2008 Presidential race — profiting so much from the popularity of their political skits, that they have “politics only” prime time specials. One of SNL’s most memorable satires was a parody of a CNN debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. In that skit a character playing Telemundo correspondent Jorge Ramos is worried that he may have offended Senator Obama and uses a debate question to query, “Senator Obama, are you mad at me?” Well, in real life we are seeing what happens to journalists who offend the Obama campaign. Barbara West, a veteran television reporter at Orlando, Florida’s WFTV, asks some probing and legitimate questions of Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Joe Biden, and the Obama campaign retaliates. The campaign informed WFTV that it is canceling a scheduled appearance of Mrs. Biden, and that “This cancellation is non-negotiable, and further opportunities for your station to interview with this campaign are unlikely, at best for the duration of the remaining days until the election.” Is this what the media can expect from an Obama administration? Ask any question they don’t like and you are “cut-off.” Contrast that heavy-handed approach with the graciousness of Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin. Palin’s character and persona have been assailed by journalist as diverse as Maureen Dowd and Peggy Noonan, but the McCain-Palin campaign has not retaliated. Palin is lampooned regularly on SNL by former SNL cast member Tina Fey, and Palin responds as a good-sport who makes a guest appearance with Fey on SNL, producing for the NBC show the highest ratings in years. Some pundits say that the initials NBC stand for the National Barack Channel. Yet, their obvious pro-Obama bias is not punished by the McCain-Palin campaign, but rewarded. Whom do you want managing the White House press office for the next four years — the thin-skinned gang who is punitive to media they don’t like, or the group that can laugh at themselves?

Two Campaign Finance Myths Busted

Think the most you can give to help the McCain or Obama campaigns is $2,300 for the primary and $2,300 for the general election? Think again. It is a myth. The New York Times reports that the fine print in the campaign laws permits donors to contribute FAR MORE than those statutory limits. (See:http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/21/us/politics/21donate.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=surpass%20campaign%20limits&st=cse&oref=slogin) The article also reports that about three times as many donors contributed $25,000 or more to the Obama effort than to the McCain effort, and that the biggest portion of the over $25,000 contributions came – surprise, surprise – from the securities and investment industry. Obama, who reneged on his original pledge to accept public financing and the lower spending that goes with it, has a campaign war-chest far larger than the McCain campaign. Senator McCain, co-author of the McCain Feingold campaign reform law (“Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002”) honored his pledge to abide by the public financing limits – much to his detriment in terms of having the ability to pay to get his campaign messages heard. In the very likely event that Obama maintains his fundraising and spending advantage (right noe $600million for the Democrats to $84million for the Republicans), it will mean that the Democrats have outspent the Republicans in both Presidential campaigns this decade. (See: http://www.fec.gov/press/press2005/20050203pressum/20050203pressum.html) So much for the myth of fat-cat Republicans outspending Democrats.

Giants Stadium venue for Greenwich youth football

About 70,000 fans at Giants stadium got a glimpse this past Sunday of what Greenwich residents can see every Sunday during the autumn. The half-time show at the New York Giants victory over the San Francisco 49ers was a series of scrimmage-plays between the Cos Cob Crushers and the Putnam Generals, two of the six teams in the Greenwich Youth Football League. The GYFL has been a tremendous resource for the perpetual Connecticut state football power-house Greenwich High School Cardinals. The volunteer coaches in the GYFL teach the kids (boys and occasionally girls) the basics of football – conditioning, training, blocking, tackling, pass routes, offensive schemes, defensive approaches and most importantly discipline and sportsmanship. The league has teams for players in 3rd grade through 8th grade. League graduates, including NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Steve Young, typically play on the GHS freshman team. GHS, with its “no-cut” policy is one of the largest athletic programs at GHS, and fields four teams, freshman, sophomore, JV and Varsity, each with a full schedule. GHS Coach Rich Albonizio has credited the GYFL with being a farm-system for the high school. The popularity of the GYFL has caused the league to increase the number of teams in recent years. In addition to the Crushers and Generals, the half-time stars at Giants Stadium, there are the BANC Raiders from Byram, the Glenville Mavericks (no connection to the McCain-Palin ticket), and two recent additions, the North Mianus Bulldogs and the Riverside Gators. More information on the GYFL can be found at: http://www.gyfl.net

GPD has new weapons against speeders

Those speeding in Greenwich beware! “OurGreenwich.com” has learned that the Greenwich Police Department is equipping nearly all of its patrol cars with new, state-of-the-art radar, courtesy of a grant. And speeders need to be on the lookout not just for those marked and unmarked Crown Vics. GPD is now the proud owner of a couple of new incognito cars, a Chevy SUV and a mean-looking Dodge Charger. In public surveys conducted by GPD over the past three years, speeding and traffic concerns have consistently ranked first among the topics Greenwich citizens care about. The police in Greenwich make approximately 10,000 traffic stops a year and issue on average 7,000 to 7,500 motor vehicle violations per year. Greenwich Police Chief, David Ridberg, says he would like to attempt to increase traffic enforcement, but that the public must understand that with limited resources it would mean reduced services in other areas. The new radar, which will be recalibrated after each day of use, is extraordinarily capable. It can pick a speeding car out of a pack of vehicles. The patrol car does not need to be standing still to determine the speed of another vehicle. So the police cruiser behind you, or driving towards you, could be clocking your speed. In fact, it can even register the speed of a vehicle BEHIND the police car. Will this new equipment translate into a financial windfall for our town by tagging a bunch of out-of-towners with speeding tickets? Nope. First, the town doesn’t make more than a pittance on tickets issued by GPD – the state takes the lion’s share of fines. Secondly, and more interestingly, traffic studies show that most speeders are local. It is you, and your neighbors (and sometimes me) who are speeding. Think about it – it is quite logical. Locals know the roads better than strangers, and thus are more likely to feel comfortable speeding on a road traveled daily. We commute much of the time on “auto-pilot,” paying more attention to our mental “to do” list than to the posted speed — unless, there is one of those “radar trailers” measuring our velocity. Then, our instinct might be to “floor it” to see the sign flash red. What the radar trailers have taught me is that some streets in our town have speed limits which are unrealistically low. I once heard that the speed limits in our town were formulated by a back-country patriarch in the 1930s having his chauffer, over the course of several Sundays, drive him on each road in town while the town-elder made notations as to what he thought the appropriate safe speed should be. As apocryphal as that story may be, it sure does feel like some roads in our town are seventy-odd years behind the times. That story provides insight into the topic of speeding. Maybe it is no longer “high society” which dictates the rules, but it is society in general which sets the norm by either condoning or condemning speeding. As Chief Ridberg is fond of saying “Speeding is a societal problem and until society deems it inappropriate behavior we, the police, will never be able to change people’s driving behavior.”

Uncivil Civics

Driving to work, contemplating what I should write for my first blog, I noticed dueling signs on Valley Road. Travelling west, on the left (appropriately) was a house with an Obama sign and directly across the street a house with a McCain-Palin sign. I thought I could write about neighbors disagreeing without being disagreeable – much like my next-door neighbor and I with our own juxtaposed McCain-Palin and Obama signs. But what struck me the next day was the sudden absence of the McCain-Palin sign from the right side of Valley Rd. Hmmmmm. A sudden change of heart? Did McCain say something to change the homeowner’s mind? Well, it turns out there is a rash of missing McCain signs in town – including mine. Indeed, there is a police department investigation of the apparent thefts. The local McCain coordinator in Greenwich, Joe Romano, reports that at least 21 of the limited number of McCain signs allotted to Greenwich were missing. As he put it, “This was way too many lost signs to be a coincidence.” And his 21 do not include the Valley Road sign, or my sign which the culprit tore up and left in shreds on the corner of my block. Interestingly, he or she walked right past a “Camillo for State Rep” sign on my lawn to get to the McCain-Palin sign. The missing signs sadden me for so many reasons. Obvious among those reasons is the lack of respect it illustrates – respect for another’s property, but moreover a lack of respect for another’s opinion, an attitude that my freedom of speech stops when you disagree with me. But this also reflects something I have long lamented – a change in the civility that once was the hallmark of our great town. A lack of civility in our local political discourse is something even those too young to vote have noticed. According to a quote in a recent Greenwich Time article, “‘Camillo was more soft-spoken, though,’ said fellow junior Yui Nobunaga, 16, from Cos Cob. Krumeich, she added, ‘kept on attacking him.’” That was exactly what I observed, myself, when I attended the League of Women Voters debate earlier this month. There were four candidates in two contested races speaking at that debate, and three of them (Republicans Fred Camillo, Scott Franz, and Democrat Mark Diamond) were all polite, focused on issues, and courteous. The sole exception was Ed Krumeich, the Democrat running against Fred Camillo. Krumeich was constantly criticizing Camillo in the LWV debate and even more so in the Channel 12 debate. He even has a section on his website where he tries to define who Fred Camillo is – and surely not in a positive way. Camillo is not an incumbent, so Krumeich resorts to personal innuendo, about Fred’s family, about Fred’s temperament, and about Fred’s careers. For instance, in debates and on his website he refers to Camillo’s “familial connections” to the carting industry. Krumeich proudly claims he is half-Italian but that half didn’t bless him with a vowel at the end of his name. As a full-Italian who is so blessed, I know a bit abut being stereo-typed. I understand what people think when they hear “family connections” and “carting industry.” Just Google “carting industry” and you will see the top links are about organized crime. Krumeich should know better – and probably does. Fred started his own garbage collection business in Greenwich. I remember seeing Fred, with his perpetual smile, driving his garbage truck down Greenwich Avenue, waving to friends early in the morning, before going to his other job. Not a silk-suited “don” but an entrepreneur running a start-up and working elsewhere to make ends meet. In another post I will write about how highly I think of Fred. This post is about the change in the tone of political discourse in our town. The stolen signs and the slurs are symptoms of a change in character. Some in our town have forgotten that the words “civic” and “civility” come from the same root. If the voters of Greenwich reward such behavior then perhaps we deserve what we get. (For more on this topic see: http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/civility.html. “The word civilité shares the same etymology with words like civilized and civilization. Quite simply, the root word means to be “a member of the household.” Just as there are certain rules that allow family members to live peacefully within a household, so there are rules of civility that allow us to live peacefully within a society. We have certain moral responsibilities to one another.”)

NY Times sterotyes Greenwich (2005)

Below is a letter I submitted to the editor of the New York Times, but which they decided not to publish.

Stacey Stowe’s article “A Name Change to Protect the Innocent” (New York Times, October 21, 2005) begins by referring to residents of a certain street in the Cos Cob section of Greenwich, Connecticut as “people of the L. L. Bean-wearing, exercise-the-dog sort” and later refers to Greenwich as “a town where Lacoste shirts and country club memberships are a virtual birthright.” Using such phrases to describe Greenwich must be in the New York Times style guide. A Nexis search reveals that just in the last five years — searching beyond five years produced too many hits for Nexis to display — the New York Times published 771 articles referencing Greenwich, Connecticut and 660 of them used the words “wealthy” “rich” “tony” etc. and the vast majority of those 111 that did not use such adjectives were paid death notices.

Sure there is wealth in Greenwich, as there is in much of the suburbs, but unlike many neighboring communities there is a vibrant middle and working class population in Greenwich. Beyond that, Greenwich is more diverse than many neighboring communities. One would never know it from reading the Times, but a simple check of demographic statistics would reveal that Greenwich’s minority population is 14.5% — more than double or triple that of New Canaan, Darien, Ridgefield or Westport, for example.

By painting Greenwich as an exclusive bastion of only the rich and famous, the New York Times is either demonstrating its ignorance of the true character of a segment of its readership, or its intentionally stereotyping. Either case is beneath the dignity of the paper.