Is Christie heading for the grave?

Friday's nor'easter didn't live up to the media hype, allowing Hackensack residents to notice how poorly some streets were plowed and to contemplate a post light, above.

A morbidly obese Governor Christie appears to be following in the footsteps of Robert "Bear" Bottigliero, a 61-year-old, 600-pound Lodi man who died of a heart attack on Feb. 2 (The Record's Local front today).

As usual, the obituary ignores the medical story, so readers don't know if a dangerous buildup in his coronary arteries or valve disease or something else killed him.

Chrsitie, 50, responding to a renewed debate over his weight, claims he is "the healthiest fat guy" in the world, and that his cholesterol and blood sugar are fine (A-4).

The GOP bully thinks he is going to live forever, judging from his personal attack on a former White House doctor who expressed concern Christie might die in office.

Christie lashed out, saying his 12-year-old son asked, "Dad, are you going to die?"

Gee. Doesn't his family know he is mortal or do they believe all the walk-on-water hype about the governor that appears in The Record and other media?

Yes. Christie is going to die, and depending on what he does about his weight and what he eats, that might be sooner rather than later.

More than three years after he took office, The Record and other New Jersey media continue to give Christie a pass on his obesity and what his administration has or hasn't done about the obesity epidemic.

They react to outlets like "60 Minutes," among the first to raise the issue of Christie's weight in 2010. 

David Letterman guesses Christie weighs 400 pounds, but the governor refuses to say whether that is accurate or to release his medical records.

Saturday's paper

Two more corrections appeared on A-2 of Saturday's paper, which whipped up hysteria among readers that Friday's storm could be another Sandy, even though it was clear that wasn't the case.

"We love you, Sandy" are the words most frequently spoken by head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her minions, who have scrambled for years to gather enough local news.

Now, all they do is fill news columns with endless stories on Sandy cleanup and relief aid, compare any other storm to the devastating superstorm and promote Christie as a Sandy saviour who is worthy of a second term.  

Today's paper

Today's A-1 and L-1 reports on the nor'easter don't contain a word about how well North Jersey towns did in plowing streets and clearing bus stops and crosswalks, except for tiny Moonachie.

At 4:30 p.m. on Saturday, an entire block of Euclid Avenue in Hackensack, between the railroad tracks and Main Street, hadn't been plowed, and the intersection of Main and Euclid was full of snow.

I'm sure other neighborhoods showed similar neglect.

This is what Hackensack residents have come to expect as property taxes rise and the quality of municipal services declines, but it's a story you'll never see in The Record, which fled the city in 2009.

No budget stories

In 2011 and 2012, Sykes and her deputy, Dan Sforza, couldn't even find time to report on the city's budget and tax rate.

Councilman John Labrosse is the only incumbent running for a new term on May 14, claiming credit for ousting former Assemblyman Ken Zisa as police chief and installing Michael Mordaga as police director.

Those claims are laughable, seeing how, despite higher property taxes, Labrosse and his fellow council members can't even get the streets plowed properly. 

Poor and rich

Another A-1 story today suggests Christie is hoarding roughly $115 million "in appropriated spending" that may eventually lead to cuts in programs for poor and low-income residents.

That's no surprise from a governor who has protected the wealthy from a tax surcharge at the expense of the middle and working classes.

Annoying columns

Did anybody read more than a few words from Road Warrior John Cichowski, who today rehashes past roof-snow columns and events dating to the 1990s and the 1980s (L-1)?

Or get past the first few lines of Columnist Mike Kelly's rewrite of recent news stories he calls "warning signs about children" (O-1)?

Millionaire's diet

Guy Fieri, a restaurant owner and celebrity chef, probably eats more unhealthy, low-quality food than any other multimillionaire in the country, judging from "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives" on the Food Network or Fools Network, as I like to call it.

So why does Staff Writer Elisa Ung waste her Sunday column, The Corner Table, promoting Fieri's crappy food at Montclair State University (BL-1)?   

Screw-up of the day

The clueless copy desk came up with a doozie today, and six-figure Production Editor Liz Houlton failed miserably in catching it.

On the Real Estate cover story (R-1), a subheadline claims: 

"Strident rules

restrict loan

modifications"

"Strident" means "loud and harsh, grating," so I'm sure the proper word the headline writer was looking for is "stringent."

LOL.