Choking readers with sports and politics

The polluted Hudson River continues to lure swimmers and hundreds of athletes suffering from sun stroke.

The editor of North Jersey's hometown daily newspaper keeps ramming sports and politics down the throats of Page 1 readers.

Today and Saturday, Editor Marty Gottlieb devoted a huge part of The Record's front page to the Stupidman U.S. Championship -- 2,500 athletes who don't known enough to stay out of the hot sun or avoid the polluted Hudson River.

Sure enough, one unidentified 43-year-old swimmer died, probably succumbing to PCB poisoning. Today's front page headline trumpets:

Heroics marred by death

How did a bunch of athletes become heroes?

If two days of Page 1 sports had readers furiously flipping through pages, the ultimate turnoff came today with nothing but state and national politics on the rest of A-1.

Horse's asses

Desperate to make the presidential contest a horse race or risk losing even more readers, Gottlieb leads the paper today with Mitt Romney's choice for a running mate to help the gazillionaire wage the GOP's war on the middle class (A-1, A-6 and A-7).

Good luck finding the continuation of the A-1 Romney story.

The famously dysfunctional news copy desk under Production Editor Liz Houlton lists the jump page as L-6 in the Local news section, instead of A-6. 

Rimbach sighting

Readers who flee to Local find the rare byline of Staff Writer Jean Rimbach, who apparently filled the role of police reporter on Saturday (L-1, L-3 and A-4).

Rimbach, a pal of head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes, had more bylines in today's paper than in all of the past six months.

One of Rimbach's stories today reported how an allegedly drunken driver and devoted reader of the Road Warrior column was injured by an NJ Transit train (L-1).

The woman, Danielle King, told police she has read nothing about commuting by mass transit in the Road Warrior column for years and assumed NJ Transit rail service had been discontinued.

King said she was lost and drove her car onto the tracks in Montvale, hoping they would lead her home.

Traffic-jam news

Today's Road Warrior column is completely devoted to roadwork, based on complaining e-mails from readers (L-1). 

Staff Writer John Cichowski could have written it while stuck in traffic on the way to the office.

F.U. to Hackensack

Sykes and her deputy, Dan Sforza, couldn't find any room for Hackensack news today.

Hackensack reporter Stephanie Akin squandered her considerable talents on a story about a man charged with firing three shots at a building (L-1 on Saturday).

More manure

On today's Better Living front, The Corner Table column by Staff Writer Elisa Ung celebrates the produce from Lani's Farm in Bordentown, one of the growers at the Tenafly Farmers' Market (BL-1).

Ung doesn't explain why she quotes Manhattan chefs who serve Steve Yoo's wonderful produce, but none in North Jersey.

And she exaggerates wildly and shows her ignorance, despite many years of food reporting, with this statement:

"Yoo's produce is not certified organic, but his methods put that label to shame ...."

The shame is on her for not knowing Certified Organic produce doesn't use artificial pesticides, either.