Christie veto of another minimum-wage hike is a sure thing

In February, Governor Christie's endorsement of wacko racist Donald J. Trump for president prompted seven major New Jersey dailies to call for his resignation. The Record of Woodland Park was the exception. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Editor Deirdre Sykes of The Record continues to sanitize Governor Christie's record, especially when it comes to his 500-plus vetoes -- many aimed at bills helping the middle and working classes.

On Saturday's front page, Staff Writer John C. Ensslin reports Christie has "several more weeks to mull over" three dozen pending bills, including one that would raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour.

Of course, Ensslin and Sykes know the fate of this latest proposal will be the same as the hike he killed in 2013, but nowhere in the story do they report that veto.

On the continuation page, Ensslin notes "Democratic lawmakers fully expect Christie will veto ... the bill raising the minimum wage from $8.38 to $10.10 per hour with additional hikes of at least $1 until it reaches $15 by 2021."

If Christie vetoes the bill, the issue won't go on the ballot until November 2017. 

After the GOP bully vetoed the earlier proposal, voters OK'd a hike in the minimum wage in November 2013.

Wasting newsprint

Even hard-core baseball fans think The Record overdid the coverage of Yankee Alex Rodriguez's last game on Friday.

Sykes ran two columns and two news stories about A-Rod on Saturday (Page 1 and the Sports front).

Sports Columnist Tara Sullivan was so desperate for an angle she seized on a thunderstorm during the pre-game ceremonies to declare:

"The human lightning rod getting interrupted by the real thing."

"A-Rod" is a creation of tabloid headline writers who never had the room to write "Rodriguez."

Local news?

Saturday's local-news section was filled with news from Paterson (L-1, L-2, L-3 and L-6).

But the local editors must have the missed the exit to Hackensack.

A photo of a man carrying bottled water up the stairs to his Hackensack apartment is all the news city residents got (L-6).

Today's Local section is completely missing Hackensack news.

Transportation writer John Cichowski had to figure out some way to justify a column on traumatic brain injuries from falls so he compares the number of deaths to "being killed on foot in traffic" (Road Warrior on L-1).

Going to pot

Today's front page carries a moving account of veterans who smoke marijuana to find relief from the haunting images of war and death (A-1).

The story by Staff Writer Todd South, himself a veteran, comes two days after the federal government's decision to withhold the approval of marijuana for medical purposes.

Officials said there is no scientific evidence it works. 

No longer Page 1 news, Christie vetoes are going uncounted

Two cars collided at Prospect Avenue and Clinton Place in Hackensack this morning, above and below. The car on the left smashed into the driver's side of a Honda sedan, pushing it onto the sidewalk.  Was one of the drivers speeding? Or did one of them run the stop sign? Tune in tomorrow for the thrilling conclusion.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

More than six months ago, The Record's editors reluctantly disclosed how many vetoes Governor Christie had executed since he took office in early 2010:

Christie's dictatorial rule by veto

That story soon was outdated, and the number of Christie vetoes has soared past 450, surely setting a record for any New Jersey governor.

Today, the GOP bully's vetoes are no longer Page 1 news, even when they involve gender pay equity.

Nor does Staff Writer John C. Ensslin bother to update the tally (A-3).

Student slain

Today, the front page reports that for the second time in a month, a college student living in off-campus Newark housing was fatally shot:

"There is no getting around the fact that [Rutgers and the New Jersey Institute of Technology] are located in a transitional neighborhood in a crime-ridden city," Staff Writer Patricia Alex says.

Fatal shootings in Newark are an almost daily occurrence, so why is this one on Page 1 and the rest of them either buried or unmentioned?

Local news?

You know there is little news in Local today when the section leads with Bergen County freeholders holding budget meetings with 18 department heads (L-1).

Although The Record hasn't covered Hackensack schools for more than a year -- or is it two -- there is a detailed story on a repairs to a  parking lot at Pascack Valley High School on L-3 today.

Mother's Day

Clueless freelancer Kate Morgan Jackson of Upper Saddle River is urging women to eat as much unhealthy food as possible on Mother's Day.

Her brunch recipes include gelato, sugar, heavy cream, bacon, ham and full-fat cheeses (BL-1 and BL-2).

Second look

Travel Editor Jill Schensul must have been desperate when she accepted a proposal by Staff Writer Kara Yorio to write Sunday's cover story on the charms of the Jersey Shore.

Talk about damning the shore with faint praise. 

Few readers will stick with Yorio, who finally comes around to prizing her time at the shore after she lands a job at the Asbury Park Press in her mid-20s, but that isn't mentioned until deep on the continuation page.

Midland Park police failed to shield mom who was slain

At Englewood Hospital and Medical Center on Wednesday afternoon, a valet put a visitor's car in a parking space reserved for the handicapped, inconveniencing the truly disabled. This wasn't an isolated incident. Complaints to employees of Millburn-based Country Club Services, which supplies the valet parking at the hospital, have fallen on deaf ears.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Record's lead story today documents how a Midland Park woman appealed to police for protection against her ex-boyfriend over a 16-day period before she was murdered in her driveway.

A shocking Page 1 story reporting "a fearful series of events" leading up to the Oct. 22 stabbing death of Suzanne Bardzell doesn't explain why police couldn't protect her (A-1 and A-8).

The victim was the mother of two teenage boys and a private-school teacher in Teaneck. The suspect, Arthur Lomando, 44, is a former New York City police officer. 

Yet the story is silent on whether his being an ex-cop influenced police and municipal courts to allow him to remain free more than two weeks after he "allegedly broke into Bardzell's home on Oct. 5 and threatened to kill her with a pair of scissors" (A-1).

Many stories

The slaying of Bardzell, 48, has received extraordinary coverage in the Woodland Park daily since her death was first reported on the Local front Oct. 23.

Lomando's alleged threat to kill the woman, two massive manhunts, a restraining order and more were reported on the front page the next day.

Four more stories about the case appeared before today's piece, which documents the failure of police, courts and other agencies to protect Bardzell, a victim of domestic violence.

Those failures might be why the newspaper had to file an Open Public Records Act request with the Bergen County Prosecutor's Office.

Bardzell's murder in the driveway of her home also raises a question about the effectiveness of a small, local police force to protect residents.

If Midland Park had more police officers, would Suzanne Bardzell be alive today?

GOP news

You have to wonder what the A-1 photo caption writer at The Record was smoking when he or she described "the division between mainstream and conservative wings of the party," a reference to Republicans in the House of Representatives.

A more accurate caption would have described "conservative and radical wings of the party."

One of Governor Christie's chief boosters and apologists is Charles Stile, The Record's political columnist, as readers can see on Page 1 today.

Don't bother with Stile's so-called analysis. The headline says it all:

Still an
uphill
fight for
Christie

Needs buzz from
debate to bring
bump in polls

Under six-figure Production Editor Liz Houlton, standards for headline writing have been thrown out the window.

Before Houlton was promoted about seven years ago, lines in headlines ending with "an," "for," and "from" would have been spiked, and the copy editor ordered to write another.

An A-4 photo from this week's GOP debate, showing Christie with a flushed face, clearly says the GOP maniac isn't presidential material.

Local news?

In Local, Staff Writer John C. Ensslin insists for at least the second time that Christie's decision to remove John Molinelli as prosecutor was "sudden and surprising" (L-2).

This despite reporting Christie acted to replace the Bergen County Democrat as long ago as January 2013.

Why now?

The Record apparently hasn't reviewed the overpriced Fleming's Prime Steakhouse & Wine Bar in the dozen years since the mediocre restaurant opened in Edgewater (BL-14).

So, why did Staff Writer Elisa Ung bother now, wasting hundreds of dollars on some of the unhealthiest food on the planet?

Ung willingly paid $48.95, $51.95 and $54.95 for fatty steaks that apparently weren't grass-fed or raised naturally.

This week, the World Health Organization said red and processed meats cause colon cancer, setting off a media storm.

The Record played the story on Page 1, then followed with columns promoting processed and red meats from clueless Food Editor Esther Davidowitz and Ung, the chief restaurant critic.

Silver Alert: Road Warrior gets lost in search of a theme

Digital signs have appeared on Cedar Lane in Teaneck, above and below, stating the 25 mph speed limit and warning drivers going faster than that, "You are speeding." Meanwhile, it has been many months since I've seen a Teaneck officer with a radar gun manning a notorious speed trap at Pomander Walk and Cedar Lane that targeted drivers crossing the Anderson Street Bridge from Hackensack.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Why is Editor Marty Gottlieb of The Record running a front-page column on drowsy truckers -- if the problem is on the decline -- and not targeting all types of speeding and aggressive driving?

And why entrust this column to the addled John Cichowski, the reporter who has peddled so much misinformation in the guise of the Road Warrior (A-1)? 

Today's column is pegged to the chain-reaction crash involving a Walmart tractor-trailer driver who hadn't slept in "more than 24 hours" and a Mercedes-Benz Sprinter limo bus carrying comedians Tracy Morgan and James McNair (A-4). 

The June 6 crash on the New Jersey Turnpike knocked the luxurious limo bus on its side, killing McNair and sending Morgan to a hospital in critical condition with a broken leg and other injuries.

But Cichowski's column ranges far afield, despite the main headline:

"Threat from trucks and

sleepy drivers on decline"

The graphic on Page 1 is for "New Jersey road deaths involving trucks," apparently from all causes, including sleepy drivers, speeding and aggressive driving, but none is specified.

Cichowski also expands the column to include all drivers who are drowsy or fall asleep, including a "dozing minivan driver" who crashed into Maggie McDonnell's sedan, killing her way back in 1997 (A-7).

But still needing to fill space, the burned out reporter discusses a 1998 crash involving a "40-ton tractor-trailer" with faulty brakes that crashed into a big SUV on Route 17 in Paramus, killing a Saddle River surgeon and his mother in law (A-7).

Still, that wasn't enough. He includes a tour bus accident on the Garden State Parkway that killed eight in 1998, admitting "it, too, did not appear to involve drowsy driving."  

So, why is it included in the column? Maybe, Cichowski's editors should issue a Silver Alert for the confused reporter.

Meanwhile, The Record and other media have ignored the low safety rating of the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter limo bus that carried Morgan.

Weak story

Another front-page story today appears to sugar coat the Tea Party, which is made up of radical, mean-spirited Republicans who are anti-immigrant and just about everything else, including taxes of any kind (A-1).

Staff Writer John C. Ensslin make Susan and Joel Winton -- founders of the West Bergen Tea Party -- sound like kindly grandparents.

But if you plow through this whitewash, you find out the Wintons have lost it, claiming their experiences doing business in communist Czechoslovakia "is one of the reasons we are passionate about saving our country" (A-6).

Forced busing

On the Local front today, Staff Writer Karen Rouse had to be dragged kicking and screaming to cover a hearing on delays and service problems faced by commuters returning to North Jersey from the antiquated Port Authority Bus Terminal in Manhattan (L-1).

Rouse, who has written almost exclusively about NJ Transit train operations, buried the lead, reporting that a Port Authority executive promised relief from terminal crowding by 2020, if the agency gets a $230 million federal grant it has applied for (L-2).

Rouse also had a Page 1 story today on the unveiling of NJ Transit's new disaster strategy after Superstorm Sandy caused $120 million in flood damage to rail cars and locomotives stored in low-lying yards (A-1).

Ignoring readers

The Better Living cover story on "five winning dishes" from Korean restaurants in North Jersey offers little to readers who don't meat, who are diabetic or who are watching their weight (BL-1).

All but one of the dishes reflect Staff Writer Elisa Ung's twin obsessions with meat or sweet, artery clogging desserts (BL-3).

There is no mention of such non-meat classics as japchae (translucent noodles) or soft-tofu stews served so hot you can cook a fresh egg in them.

Gottlieb bats only .500 on Page 1

A medical building at 5 Summit Ave. is in the running for the ugliest structure in Hackensack, above and below, especially after the ground-floor garage was declared unsafe and fenced off. A resident of Thompson Street complains valet parking attendants take up spaces on the block and endanger children. Now, the garage is being demolished.

The entrance and small lobby are in the middle section, above. The building is crammed into the corner of Summit Avenue and Essex Street, near Hackensack University Medical Center.

The building is open during "regular hrs.," according to a sign on the fence blocking access to the parking garage on the Summit Avenue side.

Marty Gottlieb, the New York Times veteran who took over The Record's newsroom more than a year ago, continues to disappoint with his selection of stories for the Sunday paper, and his mindless obsession with sports. 

Today, two out of four front-page stories don't belong anywhere near Page 1.

The best pieces are staff written -- John C. Ensslin's account of the events leading up to the suicide of the son of Freeholder David Ganz, and Scott Fallon's report on a move to cap pollution at Ford Motor Co.'s dumping ground in Ringwood. 

Not much else

The rest of today's paper is disappointing.

On the front of Local, Road Warrior John Cichowski continues to stray far afield from his commuting beat with a column on the Yellow Dot, a bird that targets the cars of seniors with a shower of droppings (L-1).

A story about the Englewood school board race has Hackensack residents wondering what happened to coverage of the city's school election (L-1).

Half a loaf

On the Better Living cover, is this the first story about the high-quality hot- and cold-food bars at Whole Foods Market since the Paramus store opened four years ago (BL-1)?

On the Opinion front, Mike Kelly asks three rhetorical questions in his first paragraph, completely turning readers off (O-1).


In more than 20 years of writing a column, Kelly still does not get that readers are looking for him to go out on a limb and express strong opinions, not to ask questions.

Second look

Head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her deputy, Dan Sforza, continue to fall flat on their faces in their struggle to find enough local news.

In Saturday's thin paper, the local-news editors and their minions needed a Dean's List (L-2) and three long wire-service obituaries to fill the Local section (L-5 and L-6).