Years too late, The Record keeps up the assault on Christie

After the 2013 George Washington Bridge lane closures, Governor Christie became the butt of jokes for cartoonists across the country, including Clay Bennett of the Chattanooga Times Free Press in Tennessee.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

An editorial in The Record today urges the state Senate on Monday to override a Governor Christie veto of "a bill that would ensure women receive the same pay as men for the same work."

Apparently, the veto occurred seven months ago, but this is the first time The Record has reported on an override attempt or what the editorial board is calling "legislative action on a bill of great importance to women across the state" (2O).

Can you imagine how many other issues of importance to taxpayers, low-wage workers, environmentalists and others the Woodland Park daily has consistently ignored?

Christie has vetoed more than 500 bills since he took office -- surely a record for any New Jersey governor -- but The Record's Trenton reporters long ago gave up counting them.

Focus on politics

The Record's editors and columnists rarely come to bat for those hurt by Christie's vetoes, because their work has been tightly focused on politics, not issues.

In the past week, only the GOP bully's last-minute proposed book deal; pay raises for legislative aides, judges and other state employees; and pulling public notices from newspapers have whipped them into a frenzy of coverage.

The headline over today's editorial:

"Fighting for a free press"

"Fighting for a profitable press" might be closer to the truth.

Today's editorial says that removing public notices from newspapers "would have a radical impact on our bottom line and the bottom lines of other newspapers across New Jersey.

"Some publications may fold and hundreds of Jersey-based jobs will be lost."

Sadly, Gannett Co. and the Borg family, the previous owner of The Record, have used publication of budgets and other public notices as an excuse to reduce the coverage of local news, even though the type they are printed in is so small hardly anyone reads them.

Christie coverage

For all of Christie's first term and the first half of his second term, The Record treated him uncritically, and portrayed the Republican governor as a compromiser who could reach across the aisle and make deals with Democrats who hold the majority in the state Legislature.

Of course, every veto and every unilateral action, such as killing the Hudson River rail tunnels and grabbing leftover funds to fix roads and bridges, gave a lie to that portrayal, but they were ignored.

Even after the paper broke the story of the politically motivated Bridgegate scandal, the editors kept on insisting there was no proof the governor knew about the plot.

All that came undone in September and October, when witness after witness testified in federal court Christie knew about the conspiracy as it was being executed, causing five mornings of gridlock in Fort Lee.

That unleashed many critical columns and editorials, and no love was lost when President-elect Donald J. Trump passed Christie over for an important post in his administration.

Trump coverage

During the presidential campaign, The Record and other news media reported every one of Trump's racially motivated attacks on President Obama without any reference to his accomplishments on the economy, health care, the environment and so much more.

That's because, as with Christie, the relentless focus was on partisanship, not policy; and insults and lies, not issues. 

In a column for the Daily News on Saturday, Linda Stasi wrote about the coming "neo-nasty era" of a Trump presidency:

"The Obamas represented not just the best of black people, but the BEST of all people -- white, black, brown and everything in between.

"The Obamas are a credit to the race all right -- the human race.

"Yet, President Obama, the most honest, decent President of my lifetime, who leaves with a 56% approval rating, is, if you listen to the right wing's very mainstream media, a man loathed and hated."

After reviewing the president's many accomplishments, Stasi concludes, "Maybe, just maybe, the most decent president of modern times ... is hated simply because he's black, a black President in a white country. Likely.

"Hidden racism in America is as rampant as blatant racism."

Every 4 years, nation's news media whip voters into a frenzy

From cartoonist Bill Day.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Record continues to ignore the issues at stake in Tuesday's election, joining other news media in declaring a horse race between GOP wacko Donald J. Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton. 

Today's trite Page 1 headline over photos of the nominees declares:

"Fighting to the finish"

So, what will Monday's A-1 headline say?

"Still fighting to the finish"

On Friday night, satirist Bill Maher warned the election of Trump would set into motion a right-wing coup with Chris Christie as attorney general and Rudy Giuliani in charge of the FBI.

For a frightening glimpse of a Dictator Trump's first 100 days in office, see The Washington Post's Dana Milbank, whose column is buried on O-4 in The Record's Opinion section:

"Among things you can expect:

"A trade war with China and Mexico, a restarting of Iran's nuclear program, millions losing their health insurance, the start of mass deportations, a possible military standoff with China in the South China Sea and North Korea, resumption of waterboarding, the use of federal agencies to go after Hillary Clinton and other Trump critics, the spectacle of the commander in chief suing women who have accused him of sexual misconduct ....

"Oh, and the Federal Reserve would be audited and guns would once again be allowed in schools."

Bridgegate verdict

Incredibly repetitious coverage of the Bridgegate scandal continues unabated two days after a federal jury found Governor Christie's former aides, Bridget Anne Kelly and Bill Baroni, guilty of conspiracy and related charges (A-1, A-11, L-1, O-1 and O-2).

The Page 1 story tries hard to keep readers interested in the possibility the verdicts in the 2013 George Washington Bridge lane closures won't stand:

"Defense

lawyers

eager to

appeal"

But anyone who bothers to turn to the continuation page learns appeals aren't filed until after Kelly and Baroni are sentenced, which is set for Feb. 21.

In fact, one expert is quoted as saying "an appeal could be filed by April" (A-11).

So much for "eager" defense attorneys.

Dogs enjoyed the crisp fall air by putting their heads out of the windows of this van, which I spotted in Teaneck on Friday.

Local news?

The Gannett-owned daily is just getting around to printing the names of candidates in local and county elections, but in the majority of contests, reporters and editors never actually covered the campaigns or informed voters about the issues (L-2 and L-3).

Letting Christie off the hook on pathetic Sandy recovery

We may pay some of the highest property taxes in the nation, but we still are burdened with an antiquated road system that causes traffic congestion, worsens air pollution and erodes productivity. The infamous Teaneck Bottleneck on Route 4, which narrows to two lanes from three, above, pleases preservationists, but delays tens of thousands of  motorists every day. The Record's editors could care less.

BY VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

You can search The Record's lead story in vain today for any mention of -- or comment from -- Governor Christie on the pathetic recovery from Superstorm Sandy in October 2012.

I guess Staff Writer Kim Lueddeke and her assignment editor didn't bother trying to locate the GOP bully, who has turned his back on New Jersey as he seeks conservative support for a White House run (A-1).

But Washington Correspondent Herb Jackson knocks himself out trying to measure whether Bridgegate has made Christie less popular than the state's indicted senior senator, Bob Menendez, a Democrat (A-1).

They're both bums, and Jackson is just wasting our time. Look at the idiotic thumbnail photo that runs with his NJ/DC column -- it's almost as silly as Columnist Mike Kelly's shit-eating grin.

Surprise bills

In her Page 1 story today, Staff Writer Lindy Washburn fails to mention a simple solution to surprise medical bills from providers who don't accept your insurance:

Refuse to pay the bill or negotiate a much lower payment.

Is Christie out?

Check out Tom Moran, a member of The Star-Ledger Editorial Board, on why Christie may quit the presidential race.

Moran is a former Record reporter who is married to Mary Jo Layton, a senior writer at the Woodland Park daily.

See: Why Christie may quit

Eye on The Record

will return later this week

Sloppy writing, editing drag down daily report

The Modern, a 47-story residential building under construction in Fort Lee, overlooks three local access lanes to the George Washington Bridge at the center of the Bridgegate scandal. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

Stories on Page 1 of The Record continue to be poorly written and edited.

You'd think the front-page would get the most attention from assignment and news editors, copy editors and proofreaders, but A-1 today exhibits more sloppy journalism.

And it's not just the Monday editions, which are put out by a relatively smaller newsroom staff.

In today's story on the possible replacement of NJ Transit chief Jim Weinstein, he is described as "a low talker" in the first paragraph or "lede" in newspaper parlance (A-1).

The lede of a news story or column should sparkle, but this one is just puzzling.

'Hoisted'?

Later in the same paragraph, we learn Weinstein "had been steeped in nearly two decades of political and public service" -- like tea, I guess.

Then, the reporter tells us, Governor Christie "hoisted" Weinstein "to the helm of NJ Transit."

You'd hoist a dead body with ropes and pulleys, but I imagine Weinstein was elevated to or appointed executive director of the state mass-transit agency.

In the second paragraph, the word "tunnel" was dropped: "... constructing a commuter rail under the Hudson River."

Two tunnels

Once you plow through all of these errors (actually, the project was to build two tunnels), the reporter gets to the point: 

Weinstein backed Christie's decision to kill the Hudson River rail tunnels as a "loyal foot soldier, laying aside his own interests to deliver the orders of his boss."

This story, as well as all of the accounts about the Port Authority and the Bridgegate scandal, are nibbling at a single theme, which WNYC-FM (New Jersey Public Radio) has been exploring in recent weeks:

NJ Transit and the Port Authority have become political arms of the Christie administration.

Syrian refugees

In a second Page 1 story today, the reporter says Syrian refugees in North Jersey hear "horror stories" about "sons executed before their fathers" (A-8).

Does she mean "in front of" their fathers? 

The Port

Today and Sunday, The Record has been reporting on the possible involvement of Port Authority police officers in the George Washington Bridge lane closures (A-1).

Two news reports on Sunday raised "new questions about whether some officers at the bridge knew of the political motivations behind the lane closures" -- to punish Fort Lee's Democratic mayor for not endorsing the GOP bully for reelection, the paper reports today (A-1).

But on Jan. 17, I spoke to an employee of Babe's Taxi in Fort Lee who said he complained to a Port Authority police officer about the resulting gridlock and was told to send "a letter to Governor Christie."

The exit for the taxi company's garage is on Hudson Street, which provides three access lanes to the bridge's upper- level toll plaza. 

On A-8, a story on a journalism award to Staff Writer Shawn Boburg for his GWB stories ignores how little reporting he has done on the Port Authority's refusal to expand mass transit amid increasing traffic congestion.

Harvy Lipman

Non-profit news appears in the Local section today (L-3), but the reporter who covered the beat since 
2006 died "last week" at 63, the Woodland Park daily reported on Feb. 12 (L-6).

Harvy Lipman was hired after Publisher Stephen A. Borg directed the editors to create a beat to cover charities and news of non-profits.

If Lipman accomplished nothing else, he will be remembered for his June 2012 article, "Hardship Grows Amid Wealth" -- about how the recession "had left pockets of poverty in wealthy communities in North Jersey."

Lipman recounted "the experiences of people who made good livings and had risen through the middle class to obtain enough wealth to live in such communities as Mahwah and Ramsey, only to find themselves jobless, with depleted retirement accounts and living on food stamps," his obituary noted.

The article is all the more remarkable because it was written for The Record, where the editors have seemed completely undisturbed by Christie's assault on New Jersey's middle class or no-tax policies that have wrecked the state's economy.

Bridgegate subpoenas are as common as ...?

The Star-Ledger's editorial cartoon deftly links all the snow we've had with the Bridgegate scandal.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

To see The Star-Ledger editorial cartoon today, click on the following link:

http://www.bluejersey.com/diary/24728/drew-sheneman-cartoon-more-snow

The Record's editorial cartoon from Jimmy Marguies also tied the Bridgegate scandal to snowfall:

http://www.northjersey.com/news/opinions/245721031_Margulies__Feb__16__2014.html