Four reporters worked on today's front-page lead on the possible suicide of a well-known North Jersey chef, but it seems that none of them went inside his Fair Lawn restaurant on Sunday to interview the manager or staff.
So readers are left in the dark. Is Joseph Cerniglia's death linked to his Campania restaurant again falling on hard times, as it did before it was turned around by Chef Gordon Ramsay on TV's "Kitchen Nightmares"?
Susan Sherrill, the new food editor at The Record of Woodland Park, contributed to this inadequate story, which is being reported three days after the Wayne man's death. We don't know the identity of the brain-dead weekend assignment editor, but demotion would be an appropriate penalty.
Precious A-1 space is wasted again today on the slaying of a Seton Hall student from Virginia at a party in East Orange, the second day in a row this story was played out front by balls-less Editor Francis Scandale, who apparently believes crime news -- even from outside the circulation area -- is the new local news.
The Local section is another disaster -- another slap in the face to readers -- from the desk of head Assignment Editor Deirdre "Loafs A Lot" Sykes.
A leering Mike Kelly weighs in with another smear column against the imam behind the proposed mosque near Ground Zero. A disaster drill is the major story on the front of the section. A drill. Not even a disaster. Where is the Hackensack news?
Without the backup of the assignment editor and the news copy desk, even the most talented reporter can turn in an incomplete story that leaves readers shaking their heads over the paper's knowledge of North Jersey. Sadly, most of the assignment and copy editors at The Record are brain-dead, as are their supervisors.
So it is with Staff Writer Ashley Kindergan's L-2 story on the closing of the Sol & Sol deli in Englewood after more than 60 years. Yes, the deli's whitefish was immortalized on "M*A*S*H" by Hawkeye, who was the main character on the TV series, not "one of the main" characters.
But Ashley, sweetheart, did you ask yourself, why Sol & Sol out of all those thousands of Jewish delis out there? It's because Alan Alda, the actor who played Hawkeye, lived for many years in Leonia, and undoubtedly ate regularly at the deli in neighboring Englewood.
Take a good look at the Page 1 photo in The Record of Woodland Park today -- the one showing classmates and friends mourning the 12-year-old Hackensack boy killed by an NJ Transit train. Much has been written about his use of an electronic device, but nothing about the irresponsibility of the transit agency, which does little to keep people off the tracks.
It's right there in the photo: There isn't a fence in sight along the entire length of Railroad Avenue to prevent 12-year-old boys or anyone else from walking on the tracks that divide a neighborhood. And what does The Record do? It blames the victims.
Read the short follow on the front of Local by Staff Writer Erik Shilling. He's relatively new to the paper, but his story focuses on the distractions of cellphones and other devices, and is missing so much detail.
Why doesn't the reporter tell readers Caeser Muloki was walking home from Hackensack Middle School, where the dismissal bell rings at 2:55 p.m. Why doesn't the reporter tell readers there is no school busing in Hackensack, and that if the boy was on a bus, he'd still be alive today? Why doesn't the reporter know Caesar always walked home with another student, but didn't Tuesday? Why didn't the reporter talk to the boy's parents?
Why? It's because Shilling and the white editors don't care one bit about this handsome African boy, and whether he is alive or dead. It's because the lazy, irresponsible editors, who spend most of their day in the office in meetings, don't care about Hackensack students and whether they have busing or about the added pollution and stress of hundreds of parents jockeying for parking spaces morning and afternoon in front of schools.
It's another royal F.U. to readers by the elitist Borg family, now represented at North Jersey Media Group by Malcolm A. "Mac" Borg's two spoiled brats, Stephen and Jennifer (Jenniphen, Stepher, Stephenfer?).
And that F.U. is delivered day after day by Francis Scandale, the editor, and Deirdre Sykes, the head assignment editor, and the minions that jump at their command. Instead of challenging authority, these editors and others at the paper roll over and play dead.
Hey, would you look at the A-1 photo and refer showing our bully of a governor getting in the face of a heckler at a political rally in California. Reporters love Chris Christie. He makes good copy. Unfortunately, he makes bad policy and has screwed more middle- and working-class residents than any New Jersey chief executive in memory, while favoring the Borgs and other wealthy residents.
But that doesn't stop The Record from quoting him in the A-3 story as telling the heckler, "We're here to bring this country together." What bullshit. He's done nothing but divide the Garden State into the haves and have-nots.
On the front of Local today, the great journalist Mike Kelly has nothing better to do than pick on an 84-year-old woman who is partially blind and deaf. Shame on you, you hack. Readers will find two stories about Emerson inside the section, but nothing about Hackensack, Englewood or Teaneck.
Don't look for any local food coverage in Better Living today. So far, Susan Sherrill, the new food editor, has fallen flat on her face.
In discussing this past Saturday's paper in the previous post, I neglected to mention the A-1 story on Jewish rituals for Yom Kippur, another in a series of such stories by Staff Writer Deena Yellin, herself an Orthodox Jew. She followed that with a story on sukkahs.
The editors are so desperate for copy, they are running these stories, but neglecting other religious groups and conducting a smear campaign against the imam behind the mosque proposal near Ground Zero. That's more inspired journalism.
Image via Wikipedia
