Shooting doesn't belong on Page 1

Columnist Bill Ervolino's NorthJersey.com blog was dropped in 2010 after he made an inappropriate comment about Malia Obama, above. On Monday, Ervolino told senior citizens that he is starting a new blog.

 

The bloodbath at Columbine High School shocked the nation nearly 13 years ago, but The Record and other media continue to cover such shootings in the same narrow way.

Today's Page 1 story on the killing of students in Ohio, taken from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, begins:

"It appears that T.J. Lane had violence in his life from the beginning."

In between school and college shootings, the media does little to change things. 

How often do you see editorials about gun control or papers trying to shame politicians into finally shutting down the gun trade? Why shouldn't every school in America have metal detectors?

The death of a few students in Ohio is no longer enough to merit front-page play in a news-business-as-usual paper like The Record. As it is, the story is mere sensationalism, shedding no light on why we continue to tolerate such violence.

North Jersey focus

The rest of A-1 has a strong North Jersey focus, including the trial of Dharun Ravi in the death of Tyler Clementi of Ridgewood and a story on two Fort Lee brothers who won Oscars for a documentary, "Undefeated."

Ralph and Glenn Zipper? Imagine the jokes these two weathered at Fort Lee High School.

Poor editing

I was riveted by the Ravi trial testimony, but unsettled by the poor editing on Page 1: "[Molly] Wei said when testifying Monday... " and "confidently answering questions brought by both attorneys ...."

How about Molly Wei "testified Monday"? And from where did the attorneys bring the questions, home or a take-out shop? I expect more from a front page crafted by Editor Marty Gottlieb.

Shameless columnist

On the front of head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes' Local section, Columnist Charles Stile apparently has dropped the word "populism," which he used incorrectly on A-1 last Thursday to describe Governor Christie's proposed income-tax cut.

An income-tax cut that panders to millionaires is just the opposite, and no one caught or corrected this major error.

Cowardly Rothman

It's good to see Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr. finally telling it like it is when it comes a fellow Democrat, Rep. Steve Rothman, who is trying to save his ass by ducking out of a fight against arch-conservative Scott Garrett (L-1).

The court hearing for Charles J. Ann of Fort Lee in the murder of girlfriend Aena Hong is the fifth story about the couple in seven days (L-1). 

A visit by Hong's parents to the Palisades Park Library to see the mural she painted was described as an "impromptu stop-over" -- another case of slipshod editing. 

Fender-bender photo

Sykes couldn't find any room for Hackensack news today, but a large photo of a non-fatal accident on Route 4 is used as L-3 filler.

George Meidanis, co-owner of the Ridge Diner in Park Ridge, is known by thousands, but his obituary is buried today on L-6.

Second look

Do you recall the weird Page 1 headline that led The Record on Monday, Feb. 13, the day I left on a week-long vacation?

Pipeline 'scar' headed here

Scary, if true. But what a clunky way to describe the potential damage of a proposed new natural-gas pipeline across North Jersey. 


And it's so definitive, as if legal action couldn't stop it. Boy, the news copy desk under Editor Liz Houlton is so all seeing and all knowing.


Boy reporter

In that same edition, Staff Writer Bill Ervolino ignored another environmental disaster in writing a feature story about two friends who bought a 1955 bronze dedication plaque for Ford Motor Co.'s Mahwah Assembly Plant they had found on Craigslist.

Ervolino must have thought he was writing another column about his parents for Better Living, because the story on the Local front goes on and on.

But nowhere does he mention Ford's shameful history of paint-sludge dumping that sickened and killed residents of an old mine area in Ringwood. The plant closed in 1980.

On Monday, Ervolino appeared before a class of about 50 senior citizens at Bergen Community College in Paramus.

He told them he'll be starting a new blog that he wanted to call, "Then and Now," about Bergen and Passaic counties. 

Of course, the pervert didn't mention his last NorthJersey.com blog was shut down in 2010 after he made an inappropriate remark about Malia Obama, the president's daughter, who was 12 at the time.

Missing the year's biggest story

Image via Wikipedia

Can you believe The Record of Woodland Park missed Monday's best story -- passage of a mean-spirited state budget pushed through the Legislature by our steamroller of a governor? What's all this Cold War-era nonsense about spies who live "next door." In Montclair? The majority of readers live in Bergen County, and we're sick and tired of the lazy editors settling for the sensational over the substantial.

Was the spy headline supposed to make me shake in my bathrobe? I know my neighbors, and they're hard-working middle class families who resent the lack of Hackensack news day after day.


So few of the reporters under head Assignment Editor Deirdre "Mother Hen" Sykes do anything, it's a colossal misjudgment to assign four of them to this stupid spy story, then give it bigger play on Page 1 today than the budget story, and for what reason?

Was it early deadlines, which sacrifice getting late, breaking news into the paper to accommodate the dysfunctional home-delivery system? Did Sykes and Editor Frank "Castrato" Scandale want to go home rather than get the year's biggest story into the paper? Or was it simply more incompetence?

Governor Christie's budget represents the biggest assault on the middle and working classes, the elderly and the poor in New Jersey history, while benefiting small-business owners and such fat cats as the Borgs. 

Charles Stile's column has run on the front before. Why not today, when he describes the once-moderate state Republican Party's nasty turn? In fact, all of the elements on A-6 should have been on A-1 today. The inconsequential spy story actually gets more space than this historically flawed budget and its impact on our way of life. Even Alfred P. Doblin, the editorial page editor, took the evening off, leaving behind two lame editorials.


On A-10, a letter to the editor savages Doblin for his June 25 column with the headline, "Springtime for Gordon, winter for Teterboro." The buffoonish Doblin, it seems, invoked a comedic song about Hitler to criticize Sen. Robert Gordon, the Fair Lawn Democrat who happens to be Jewish, for sponsoring the proposal to break up Teterboro.

Doblin's juvenile style reminds me of that other jerk on the staff, Bill Ervolino, whose northjersey.com blog was shut down in March after inappropriate references to Malia Obama, then 12, one of the president's daughter. When are the Borgs and Scandale going to dump the offensive Ervolino and clownish Doblin?

The lead story on the Local front has the headline, "Chase ends in crash," that the news copy  editors keep on a save-get key. There is more police news in the section, including Giovanna Fabiano's contribution from Englewood, but no municipal news from that city, Hackensack or Teaneck. 


Should we wait for Fabiano's takeout on the Hispanic community in Englewood -- both legal and illegal -- and how it has added a new dimension to the city? Nah. She's too lazy to tackle enterprise, and her assignment editor is clueless. She spends so little time in Englewood, people are always asking to see her press pass.


But I really shouldn't single her out for criticism when Staff Writer Jean Rimbach trades on her friendship with "Mother Hen" Sykes to write an average of one story a year. When is the last time Shawn Boburg wrote a story? Or Monsy Alvarado?

The reporting staff was basically untouched by the downsizing that started in 2008, so it's likely there are still about 50 reporters or specialty writers in the newsroom. If you see only eight bylines in the paper, what does that mean? What are the others doing to justify their existence?

(Map: Teterboro)

Jerry DeMarco on Bill Ervolino

Image via Wikipedia

Jerry DeMarco, whose own tenure at The Record wasn't without controversy, explores Bill Ervolino's decision to remove the perverted blog post about 12-year-old Malia Obama (photo). Find the link to CliffView Pilot.com below:

Jerry DeMarco on Bill Ervolino

More from the thumb-sucker

The Record of Woodland Park's really unfunny humor columnist Bill Ervolino has posted what looks like an apology for asking readers to imagine 12-year-old Malia Obama naked, and has removed the post from his blog. Here are excerpts:

"OK. I have deleted my “questionable” question about Bo and Malia. Hopefully, the world is a better place now and we can all take a deep breath and move on. Frankly, I hate to remove any comments, whether they’re positive or negative, but I can’t delete one (the post) without the other (your comments).

"I don’t offend you guys very often, but when I do, I try to apologize. It certainly wasn’t my intent to offend or even to suggest something inappropriate. I listed the names in my question as if it were some kind of dopey personality test. (Maybe TOO dopey, in this case.) I have a hard time thinking a question would put that kind of thought into anyone’s head if it wasn’t there already. But, not having kids myself, I sometimes fail to realize how parents feel about certain topics, especially if they have daughters."

Posted by Bill Ervolino on 01/20 at 02:19 PM

You can read more at the following link to his blog (the post headed: "Delete, delete"): Mea asshole

'I'll proceed with caution'

This is all The Record of Woodland Park's Bill Ervolino had to say in response to comments about his blog post Monday night on whether readers wanted to see 12-year-old Malia Obama naked:

FROM BILL: OK. well at least I know you’re all still out there. I doubt I inspired any pedophiles. Or pet-ophiles. But i’ll proceed with caution…

Posted by Bill Ervolino on 01/20 at 01:05 AM

Of course, I doubt his editor, Barbara Jaeger, will do what any so-called journalist should: Give him the heave-ho.

See earlier post, "Bill Ervolino is a disgrace"

Bill Ervolino is a disgrace

Image via Wikipedia


One of the unfunniest people at The Record of Woodland Park is humor columnist Bill Ervolino, who has been trying our patience for years.

If you need any further evidence of his perverted sense of humor, click on the link to his so-called blog below. Under "Pressing question of the night," you'll find a photo of the White House dog and the following question:

"Who would you rather see nude: Barack, Michelle, Malia or Bo?"

I guess Ervolino includes Malia Obama, who is 12, in an appeal to all the child pornographers out there.

Thumb sucker Bill Ervolino -- unplugged