On Christie's GWB excuses, why did it take this long?

On a two-hour visit Friday to Westfield Garden State Plaza in Paramus -- where a gunman fired random shots and committed suicide last Nov. 4 -- I didn't see a single security guard inside the mall. A man wearing a safety vest and a shirt with a patch on his shirt helped shoppers cross the busy road near this unguarded entrance.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Did it really take nearly five months for The Record's editors to make a detailed case against what Governor Christie said he knew about the George Washington Bridge lane closures ordered by his aides, and how little he dug into it?

And why is this exhaustive examination of the "evidence" presented by Staff Writer Charles Stile, whose boring political columns are chiefly responsible for voter apathy in North Jersey (A-1 and A-6)?

Out of Stile

This should have been published as a news investigation, not as an opinion column by a writer who has been one of the biggest boosters of Christie's White House ambitions. 

No other credit is given for the column, so it isn't known whether Port Authority reporter Shawn Boburg or Staff Writer Melissa Hayes, who is assigned to follow the governor, worked on the project.

The bridge scandal broke open on Jan. 8, when The Record reported Bridget Anne Kelly, then Christie's deputy chief of staff, e-mailed David Wildstein, a Port Authority executive:

"Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee."

Wildstein, one of Christie's cronies on the bi-state agency that operates the bridge, responded to the Aug. 18 message: "Got it."

The result was four days of early September gridlock in Fort Lee, where Democratic Mayor Mark Sokolich had refused to endorse the GOP bully for reelection.

We're in a jam

Since then, all the key figures, including Christie, have stymied investigators by lawyering up, taking the Fifth, stonewalling or saying they don't remember anything.

And they are sticking you and me with their legal bills, which could total $2 million.

In return for their loyalty, Press Secretary Michael Drewniak and other members of Christie's staff got raises averaging 23%.

Isn't that hush money?

Afterthoughts

The Christie piece and another front-page story on the "resegregation" of Teaneck schools seem like afterthoughts amid all the coverage of a POW released in Afghanistan, and a bunch of foul-mouthed and foul-smelling pro hockey players (A-1).

The number of errors in the last two Sunday editions has declined dramatically in the absence of columns by Road Warrior John Cichowski.

The best story in today's Local section is the obituary for Jewish-Chinese community theater actor Edward B. Thom, formerly of Englewood (L-1).

Self-driving hype

On the Opinion front, a column by Edward Niedermeyer, an auto-industry consultant, oversells the significance of Google's self-driving car (O-1).

Like millions of hybrid and all-electric cars before it, the driverless car will make only small inroads into sales of gas-guzzling SUVs and ever-more-powerful performance and sports sedans.

In a masterful rewrite of previous columns, Staff Writer Mike Kelly bluffs his way through another piece on another disturbed gunman, who killed six and wounded 22 in California (O-1).

'Worst governor'

Letter writer Stephen Gigante of Hackensack hits the bull's-eye on Christie, who has proven such an elusive target for the editors (O-3):

"From the George Washington Bridge scandal, to violations of OPRA, to diverting Port Authority ... funds to the Pulaski Skyway, to the failure to make pension payments and to putting himself in commercials hyping Sandy relief [before last November's election], Governor Christie is ... becoming a footnote for the term 'worst Governor New Jersey has ever had.'"

Greed is good

The upbeat Business section cover story on the expansion of North Jersey hospitals outside their main campuses doesn't explore the impact of their tax-exempt status on municipal property taxes (R-1).

Most of Hackensack University Medical Center's 2.5 million square feet "on its main campus" in Hackensack is tax exempt, raising the levy paid by city residents.

HUMC has fundamentally altered the character of the neighborhood and makes a big demand on services, but gives little back to the city. 

If the hospital buys a building in another town, will that property be tax exempt as well? The story is silent on that angle. 

Flip side of news

Given The Record's superficial coverage of all of the foreclosures in New Jersey, today's Real Estate cover on Kevin Errico -- a Re/Max agent in Saddle River who "flips" empty homes for profit -- is really in bad taste (R-1).

But it is no surprise. 

Real Estate and The Record's Business section reflect the Borg family's enduring philosophy of putting profit ahead of journalism. 

This is what 'follow the money' means

Dan Sforza, a local-news assignment editor at The Record of Woodland Park, was the inspiration for this sculpture at Hackensack University Medical Center.

Editor's note: "Eye on The Record" is using a new template on Google's Blogger platform after the original became corrupted. Popular Posts, My Blog Roll and a list of previous posts appear at the end of the posts, instead of on the right. I am still able to use the original template for "Do You Really Know What You're Eating," my food blog.

Another Page 1 story on the cozy relationship between Governor Christie and the national group that helped him win "his long-shot campaign" in 2009 is a good example of how the media can explore the corrupting influence of money.

It's a tool The Record's editors have rarely used in recent years as they virtually ignored the need for campaign-finance reform and local ordinances against "pay to play."

In last year's North Jersey congressional campaigns, the Woodland Park daily gave the most coverage to candidates who raised the most special-interest money, such as author and relentless self-promoter Shmuley Boteach, a rabbi who lives in Englewood.

That bias has continued in the early months of New Jersey's gubernatorial campaign between Christie, the GOP bully, and state Sen. Barbara Buono, D-Metuchen. 

Money in local election

Now, Hackensack readers wonder whether The Record will "follow the money" backing candidates in the campaign for City Council. The election is on May 14.

The phrase "follow the money" refers to an investigative tool used by Washington Post reporters in their stories uncovering the Watergate break-in during the Nixon administration. 

More poor editing

Before I move on to other Page 1 stories, check out the incredibly sloppy editing of Washington Correspondent Herb Jackson's story on the Republican Governors Association and Christie:

The lead paragraph states that Christie won his campaign against Jon Corzine "four years ago," but he didn't actually "win" until November 2009. 

Taking flight   

Readers who believe the paper's local-news coverage is for the birds find confirmation of that in stories and photos on A-1 and L-1 today.

At the top of the front page, Staff Writer John Brennan continues to mine his addicted gamblers beat -- in yet another story that puts the vast majority of readers to sleep.  

Dull headline

Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin should stop writing headlines for editorials, if he is going to continue coming up with duds like this one on A-13 today:

North Jersey suffers

Totowa development center to close  

That  is such old news, especially when the editorial criticizes the Christie administration for not sending officials from the state Department of Human Services to talk to concerned families at a public hearing.

No accident

There is so little local news today a layout editor had to blow up another gee-whiz, non-fatal, rollover-accident photo as big as possible to fill a gaping hole on the Local front today.

"Car wreck in Westwood" is the incredibly unimaginative overline, and the caption blames police for the usual lack of information about the driver or the cause of the accident.

Millionaire chef

For the second day in a row, Better Living promotes another celebrity chef on its cover (BL-1).

"Jose Andres is not a just chef and prolific restaurateur," Staff Writer Elisa Ung says in the first paragraph, hoping to whet readers' appetites.

Tickets to the New Jersey Wine and Food Festival that Andres "healdines" range from $30 to $448.

No thanks.

Paper hits my driveway with a thump

Image via Wikipedia

The Record's Tower of Babel.

God knows my language can get stale, when, for example, I used the word "lame" three times in the same post recently before rereading it and revising it. But some writers latch onto a word and don't let go for years and years, and it crops up all the time in their work.


The Record of Woodland Park today provides a perfect example in Columnist Mike Kelly, who has an unusual affection for the word "thump." 


Kelly long ago stopped writing creatively and now merely pushes around words, as he does in this Opinion front column: "The thump of bombs and the pop of bullets will likely continue as part of Iraq's tumultuous soundtrack."


I did a Google search and from my own editing of his columns and stories over the years, I recall Kelly has used the word thump time and again, and not just to describe bombs. 
 
He's used the "thump of jackhammers" at least twice. (Jackhammers don't thump, do they?) And there was the "thump" of rhetoric, drums and shoes.



Kelly is one of those reporters who has been around so long, no one -- not the editors, not the publisher -- pays any attention to what he writes, just as long as he files his three columns a week. 


Others who fall into that category include Road Warrior John Cichowski, Staff Writer John Brennan and Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin -- all of whom are glorified, overpaid space fillers.


They get away with this because some writers become the editors' favorites whether they have talent or not, while others never get off the shit list. Who loses here? The reader does, big time.


Burying news


The best story in today's paper is on North Jersey police departments struggling to diversify, but why isn't it on Page 1, in place of the lead story about high school athletics' governing body?


It's probably because Editor Francis "Frank The Castrato" Scandale and head Assignment Editor Deirdre "Mother Hen" Sykes didn't want to give too much prominence to the police story, lest anyone question their own miserable records in diversifying the newsroom or covering minority communities in Bergen County. 


For example, Kelly and Cichowski are two of the overwhelmingly white, male columnists at the former Hackensack daily. Scandale, Sykes and Features Director Barbara Jaeger have methodically gotten rid of their black, Hispanic and women columnists.


The Local news section is pretty thin today, with no news of Hackensack, Teaneck, Englewood and many other towns, except for references to them in the police diversity story. 


On L-1, Cichowski blabbers on about crossing guards -- about as far away as you can get from his mission, which is to cover commuting.


On L-6, a package on the Labor Day fire in Passaic city 25 years ago omits anything on whether the devastated area was rebuilt.


Paid for gorging


In Better Living, we find a clue to why Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung failed readers by not writing a fine-dining review for this past Friday's paper. She apparently was stuffing her face at three places favored by the so-called real housewives -- who, along with Ung, are another joke played on the Garden State.


Why have the editors commanded so much copy about these trashy housewives and the other young, white trash from "Jersey Shore," compared to "The Sopranos," a series that was superior in every way imaginable?