Despite Christie, justice in New Jersey seems assured

Cross traffic is rare at this red light in the middle of nowhere. Stop signs would work fine. Welcome to the Bergen Town Center in Paramus. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

You have to read between the lines of today's lead Page 1 story in The Record to find out Democrats have put the kibosh on Governor Christie's evil plan to remake the state Supreme Court in his own conservative image.

The A-1 headline is awkward and the story is poorly edited, making readers wait until the continuation page for the real news:

"For years, Governor Christie has railed against [Chief Justice Stewart] Rabner and the court he heads, both in New Jersey and at appearances across the country, calling the justices activists and decrying their decisions that disagreed with his" (A-6).

"Their decisions that disagreed with his"? Sheesh. And in the photo caption on A-6, the sitting chief justice is referred to as a "nominee."

Rabner, 53, who was questioned by lawmakers on Monday, appears assured of renomination and tenure until 2030.

Right after he took office in 2010, the mean-spirited Christie got rid of the only African-American on the high court, then set out to eliminate affordable housing and state aid to the state's poorest school districts.

The GOP bully also put forward several turkeys as his own conservative nominees for the high court, but most of them were rejected.

A progressive court

Imagine a high court that catered to Christie's wealthy supporters, and followed the governor's mean-spirited agenda to eliminate all social programs and taxes on the rich. 

That's what we avoid with Rabner at the helm of a progressive court that for many decades has been at the forefront on product liability, housing for low- and moderate-income residents and other important issues.

Unintended hilarity

Again on the front page, would you look at the stark contrast between the photos of aging TV columnist Ginny Rohan and the preening Kardashians, bimbos who probably have spent millions on plastic surgery (A-1).

Rohan's column is silly. Why waste all this prime space on the supposed impact of the two-decade-old O.J. Simpson case on TV reality shows?

That distracts from the sad fact that most TV --including CNN and other news reports -- is just crap. Why doesn't Rohan try to explain that?

50% error rate?

As usual, today's Road Warrior column is filled with numbers, but many of them are probably wrong, given Staff Writer John Cichowski's advancing Alzheimer's disease (L-1).

Is his error rate 50% or higher? With no editing or fact-checking of his column, it's anybody guess.

In his Road Warrior column last Friday, Cichowski said the replacement of upper-level road decking on the George Washington Bridge would take a "few weeks," contradicting a front-page story on the same day that reported the duration of the work as 12 weeks or a few months (Friday's A-9).

"The Road Warrior confuses the hell out of everyone by reporting that the upper-level lanes will be closed overnight for this work, when, in fact, one lane will always remain open in one direction and all four lanes will remain open in the other direction," according to the Facebook page for Road Warrior Bloopers.

Cichowski also describes the road surface as "slabs of steel decking." That's also wrong.

"The steel deck panels support slabs of pavement," according to the Bloopers editor

See:

Disoriented Road Warrior can't find GWB

Gravely injured comedian rode in limo van prone to rollover

A busy crosswalk near the J.C. Penney entrance to Westfield Garden State Plaza was closed on Saturday afternoon, prompting many visitors to cross where there was no crosswalk or pedestrian signal, below. The Paramus mall, the biggest in the state, apparently couldn't find an employee to help shoppers cross the road, as it does when that crosswalk is open.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Federal auto safety officials have expressed concern about the high rollover risk of the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter van similar to the one involved in a crash that left comedian Tracy Morgan in critical condition.

On A-3 today, the Record used an Associated Press story about the New Jersey Turnpike chain-reaction crash on Saturday that left a fellow comedian dead and two others seriously hurt.

The driver of the Walmart tractor-trailer that rammed Morgan's Mercedes-Benz "limo bus" has been charged with death by auto, the wire service reported.

But the story makes no mention of National Highway Transportation Safety Administration officials who rated the 2012 Mercedes-Benz Sprinter 2500 Van's risk of rollover at 84.3%.

The vehicle -- on which the limo bus is based -- was given a safety rating of one star, the lowest on the 5-star safety scale, according to safecar.gov, the NHTSA Web site. 

I have spoken to drivers of the M-B Sprinter Van who say they have to be careful when turning corners because of the vehicle's high center of gravity.

Morgan's vehicle ended up on its side. The AP story also neglects to mention whether the comedian and other passengers were wearing seat belts or were protected by air bags.

Horse's asses

Today's front page carries a story on Saturday's Belmont Stakes by Staff Writer John Rowe, a lifer.

What a waste of space. Which horse's ass in the newsroom decided to give this turd of a story Page 1 play?

A-1 also brings us yet another column speculating on what Governor Christie's former chief of staff will tell investigators about the George Washington Bridge lane closures in Democratic Fort Lee.

Columnist Charles Stile could have written just one word: "Nothing."

Older drivers

On the Local front, Road Warrior John Cichowski wastes our time with another boring column on teen drivers (L-1).

Cichowski knows older drivers like himself are the ones who need safety retraining, but he has resisted reporting on that issue since he took over the column in 2003.

Teaneck reporter Aaron Morrison should get a bonus for being one of the few writers who profile prominent residents while they are still alive (L-1).

Today, he writes about jazz photographer Chuck Stewart.

On the Business front, a photo caption shows Taro Eizumi outside Fort Lee's BNB Hana Bank, which "caters to Korean-Americans" (B-1).

But judging from his last name, Eizumi is Japanese, not Korean.

Selling out

Staff Writer Elisa Ung today has a second column about no-show restaurant customers, as if this is such an overwhelming problem (BL-1).

If she chose to write about issues facing customers in her column, The Corner Table, she could do 52 columns a year on the slave wages restaurant owners pay servers and how they expect the customer to tip well to make up the difference.

Drew Nieporent, John Pilourias and the other wealthy restaurateurs or chefs she quotes have duped her into ignoring this conflict.

When the kitchen burns your food or serves you cheap fish instead of the red snapper listed on the menu, what are you going to do? 

If you stiff the server, you're letting the owner off of the hook, but isn't that the whole point of the corrupt tipping system?

Tipping likely tops restaurant customers' complaints, but it's been a few years since Ung even made any attempt to discuss the issue.

And we know why. Restaurant advertising is a major source of revenue for North Jersey Media Group.

Ung is not about to bite the hand that feeds her. OK. She eats enough for two or three. So, it's the hand that stuffs her face.

Haggard traveler

Travel Editor Jill Schensul likely shocked readers a week ago, when she published "selfies" of her haggard face on a bad-hair day -- a stark contrast to her column's thumbnail photo (T-1).

Today, the column photo, which was taken more than a decade ago, appears on the Travel front above one of her selfies.

Other outdated column photos appear in the paper today: Mike Kelly's shit-eating grin on O-1, and John Rowe's uncharacteristic smile on A-1.

Poor Virginia Rohan. A new, unattractive column photo of The Record's TV writer has been used for the past few months, showing her bloated face.

Saturday's paper

Lodi and Hackensack taxpayers' blood was boiling after reading stories on A-1 and L-3 of Saturday's paper.

Lodi Police Chief Vincent Caruso is one in a long line of department heads who collect hundreds of thousands of dollars for unused time off -- in his case, $342,000, according to the front-page account.

The Record has never questioned why Christie put a ceiling on the salaries of school superintendents, but not on police chiefs, or failed to reform these outrageous payouts.

In Hackensack, allies of the disgraced Zisa family, which ran the city for decades, may cost taxpayers $20,000, according to a report from Staff Writer Christopher Maag.

The $20,000 would cover legal fees in a dispute over copies of bills submitted by City Attorney Thomas Scrivo between October and Jan. 15, Maag reported.

Maag notes the new City Council "fired Richard Salkin, the city attorney with close ties to the Zisa family and to city Democratic Party Chairwoman Lynn Hurwitz, and replaced him with Scrivo."

But that is wrong. Salkin, a double dipper, was municipal prosecutor as well as Board of Education attorney.  He continues in the school board job.

I didn't see a correction in today's paper.

Masterful editing

In Saturday's lead story on Page 1, I didn't see a single reference to the hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks Christie has given wealthy business owners and the pitifully few jobs created in return.

The story reported the national economy has replaced all of the jobs lost in the recession, but New Jersey "so far has recovered only half of its vanished jobs."

This kind of irresponsible editing ensured the GOP bully's reelection last November, despite one of the worst records of any New Jersey governor.