Hey, Guv, heard about the obesity epidemic?

Image via Wikipedia

The front page of The Record of Woodland Park today reports that Gov. Christie's is proposing cuts in aid to breakfast and lunch programs for low-income children, and that may force some schools to drop fresh fruit and vegetables during the obesity epidemic. 

This story is big enough to dominate the page, but the lazy, incompetent editors were out to sell papers with the murder of an elderly Pal Park woman whose house was set on fire afterward. Too bad the headlines are clunky -- "Woman stabbed before blaze" and "Was fire set to hide evidence?" -- and the photographer didn't get there until all the excitement was over. Only the body bag tells you she died. How about: 

Elderly woman

stabbed, burned

Was fire set to hide slaying?

I find it strange that The Record and most of the other media have been ignoring the obesity epidemic. Since Christie took office, no reporter apparently has asked him what the state is doing to ease obesity in children and adults.

The Record's food and news editor have consistently denied they have a responsibility to launch a project on obesity. The food editor is obsessed with meat and the on-leave restaurant reviewer is obsessed with dessert, and they report on those subjects with abandon. What examples do they set for readers?

On A-2, there are three corrections -- the longest one to fix an inaccurate graphic that ran Sunday. The newspaper has been struggling with inaccurate graphics for many, many years -- meetings were held, teeth gnashed -- and still it has failed to improve them. 


You have to wonder why News Production Director Liz Houlton has fallen flat on her face in trying to achieve this important goal (after all, she is probably making well over $100,000). But remember that Houlton once ran the copy desk for Features Director Barbara Jaeger, and failed to catch the numerous errors in food and other stories that appeared regularly in the paper. 


Maybe these two directors -- pals Houlton and Jaeger -- would be more successful directing traffic.

Why is the federal report on the incompetent air traffic controller at Teterboro Airport buried on A-4? Nine people died in the resulting collision of a small plane and sightseeing helicopter over the Hudson River, and the airport is a huge quality-of-life issue in Bergen County (another big story ignored by the paper). Page A-5 is full of stories from The Star-Ledger, but the one on student protests ignores Bergen and Passaic counties.

The only Hackensack news in the paper today is a story on a talk at the high school about online predators.In Englewood news, a man beaten on the street in the middle of the night was hospitalized.


Since Christie took office in January, readers have been witnessing his attempts to cut a wide range of programs that benefit the middle and working classes -- as well as aid to schools and towns -- while trying to preserve the wealth of his rich friends, including the Borg family, owners of North Jersey Media Group.

Maybe as publishers of so many daily and weekly newspapers, Malcolm, Stephen and Jennifer Borg should disclose their political sympathies and contributions.