Monday, December 24, 2012

Taking more breaks from news, accuracy

Hackensack, New Jersey
The Record continues to neglect Hackensack news. (Photo credit: Dougtone)




Didn't we read today's Page 1 story about New Jersey immigrants "bracing for another holiday season away from family" last year and the year before?

Why is The Record running a front-page photo of Santa Claus giving gifts in hurricane-ravaged Moonachie, with no reference to A-3, where readers find another Santa doing the same in South Seaside Park?

Does a story about American flags at the 9/11 Memorial really belong on the front page, even on a slow-news day like today?


Error-prone editor


On that story's continuation page, Production Editor Liz Houlton clueless layout and copy editors screwed up two photos of the 9/11 Memorial in Manhattan (A-4).

The two photos were supposed to appear side by side, but were stacked on top of each other. Still, the caption refers to a "left" photo and a "right" photo.

On A-6, a photo caption contains the awkward phrase: " ... for relatives in [Colombia] at El Rinconcito in Hackensack."

The caption also misspells the country of Colombia as "Columbia." 

Back to school?

Apparently, Houlton and none of the copy editors attended the well-respected journalism school in Columbia, Mo., where the first lesson was "accuracy, accuracy, accuracy."

Below that on A-6, a caption says "onlookers, left, viewing the membrane filtration plant," but no building is visible in that photo. 

On A-8, the Business page, the words "Chinese food" inexplicably appear over a graphic on the march of crappy American fast food across China. 

I don't think we're going to see a McBroccoli sandwich anytime soon.

Environment hits back 

Superstorm Sandy and the freak snowstorm two days before Halloween in 2011 show the environment is striking back against all the human abuse it has sustained in recent decades. 

Yet, lazy head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her deputy, Dan Sforza, actually quote lazy shoppers who refuse to buy reusable bags and help the environment (A-1 and L-1).

And in a photo caption, Houlton's moronic copy editors describes one responsible shopper's reusable bag as a "tote" bag (L-1).

Plastic-bag fees have been common in Europe for years. 

 Car-crash photos

On L-2, four beautiful photos from a reader, Judith Kopitar of Hawthorne, are a welcome break from all the non-fatal accident photos Sykes and Sforza run to fill space in the Local news section.

An L-6 story on the retirement of the overpaid Fort Lee police chief -- who got $210, 437 this year -- only serves to remind readers Sykes and Sforza never bothered to ask Governor Christie an important question:

Why did the GOP bully cap school superintendents' salaries at $175,000, but left his law-enforcement pals still living high on the hog.

The story doesn't say how many sick days he'll be cashing in or what his pension will be, but you can assume it will be huge.

Can you imagine how many donuts the ex-chief's pension will buy?

 
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