Now is the time to defeat Trump, impeach lapdog Christie

From cartoonist Jeff Darcy of Cleveland.com, the website of The Plain Dealer, above and below.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

For commentary on the national nightmare of a possible victory by Donald J. Trump on Tuesday, readers of The Record have to look elsewhere.

Today, for example, Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin exposes campaign fliers depicting 5th Congressional District challenger Josh Gottheimer, who is Jewish, as a devil with horns (A-9).

He blasts Sarah Neibart, campaign manager for Rep. Scott Garrett, R-Wantage, for suggesting the Gottheimer campaign is behind "a political ploy manufactured by them to fabricate a hate crime."

"This is ... exactly what the Nazis would say. Blame the victim for orchestrating his own victimization," Doblin writes.

But I don't recall Doblin condemning Trump for encouraging his supporters to launch attacks against Jewish reporters, nor has he demanded the resignation or impeachment of Governor Christie for lying and covering up his role in the Bridgegate scandal.

After Christie dropped out of the presidential race in February and endorsed Trump's radical GOP White House campaign, The Star-Ledger and six Gannett-owned dailies called on him to resign.

The Woodland Park daily still hasn't followed suit after all of the testimony at the Bridgegate trial that Christie knew about the George Washington Bridge lane closures as they were happening in September 2013.

Clinton emails

The Record continues to channel Republican attacks against Democrat Hillary Clinton and her emails as secretary of state.

Today's Page 1 headline declares the FBI "provides Clinton with last-minute relief," and what follows is yet another sensational report from The Associated Press, which has legitimized every lie from wacko racist Trump in the past two years.

'Rigged' election

Over at The New York Times, Columnist Paul Krugman writes about how the presidential election was "rigged."

Krugman includes voter suppression in southern states, Russian hacking of Clinton's emails; FBI Director James Comey, "who used his position to spread innuendo and influence the election;" and pro-Trump FBI agents, who have been spreading "claims and allegations that may not have anything to do with reality."

"The election was rigged by mainstream news organizations, many of which simply refused to report on policy issues, a refusal that clearly favored the candidate who lies all the time, and has no coherent proposals to offer," Krugman says.

"In 2016, all three [nightly news broadcasts] combined devoted a total of 32 minutes to coverage of issues -- all issues. Climate change, the most important issue we face, received no coverage at all.

"The election was rigged by the media obsession with Hillary Clinton's emails. She shouldn't have used her own server, but there is no evidence at all that she did anything unethical, let along illegal.

"Yet those networks that found only 32 minutes for all policy issues combined found 100 minutes to talk about Clinton emails."

40-day volunteer

Good for Nyree Miscia, a photogenic mother of four who volunteered for 40 days before her 40th birthday and got nearly the entire Better Living cover devoted to her today.

Excuse me for mentioning that thousands of volunteers have given their time for many more months, years and decades, and have never seen their names or photos in The Record.

What are the editors waiting for? Let's impeach Christie

From Hackensack to Trenton to Washington, D.C., The Record's editors, columnists and reporters are addicted to writing almost everything in terms of partisan politics.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Could Editor Martin Gottlieb of The Record actually be as boring as the front pages he assembles for North Jersey readers?

This Sunday edition brings the usual tedious mixing and balancing of local, state, national and international news -- much like what Gottlieb's former paper, The New York Times, does every day.

Today, the big photo on Page 1 is from Srebrenica, which I'm almost sure isn't one of the 86 towns in Bergen and Passaic counties (A-1).

The lead story is about improved on-time performance at Newark Liberty International Airport -- of little interest to readers who might take a flight once or twice a year (A-1).

The "local" story is about a deaf athlete at Hackensack High School who is too old to play football and baseball in his senior year (A-1).

Impeach Christie

To add insult to injury, the obligatory political column on Governor Christie's presidential campaign doesn't even explore the possibility of his being impeached in New Jersey (A-1).

Nor does an Opinion column on Christie by Brigid Harrison, a political science and law professor at Montclair State (O-1).

Harrison may be a good professor, but I'll bet her five books on American politics will put you to sleep faster than The Record's front page today.

Good cop, bad cop

And because she apparently gets no editing, her column today is perplexing:

First, she says a bill by Democratic leaders in the state Legislature -- to require Christie to resign from office because he is running for president -- "sounds like a good idea" (O-2).

Then, she notes the state has "suffered" as Christie panders to conservative Republicans, and has been pushed to "the brink of a fiscal cliff."

"The governor has maintained he is always available by cellphone [!!!] to deal with state issues," Harrison says with a straight face. "Yet 71 percent [of New Jerseyans] think Christie can't effectively govern the state and run for president."

After that buildup, Harrison calls the Democratic bill a "joke," denounces it as a political stunt and declares it is legally flawed.

In Constitution

But she never mentions that according to the New Jersey Constitution, the state Assembly can bring impeachment charges against Christie, who would be tried in the Senate's "court."

Assemblyman John Wisniewski, D-Middlesex, brought up the possibility of impeachment in January 2014, if investigators found a direct link between Christie and the George Washington Bridge lane closures.

That link still may come at the federal trial of Bridget Anne Kelly, the close aide Christie fired after her email to the Port Authority -- "Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee" -- emerged.

More errors

The ugly head of the Queen of Errors rears up at least twice today:

On Page 1, six-figure Production Editor Liz Houlton should have insisted on affiliations under a double byline on the story discussing a new novel by Harper Lee (A-1).

And in the TV Times tab, the cover story is on Page 5, not on the indicated Page 3.

Better Living

Elisa Ung, the paper's chief restaurant critic, isn't about to tackle two major issues that impact the bottom line of wealthy owners -- the broken tipping system, and menus that don't list whether the meat and poultry served are raised naturally (BL-1).

Today, her column, The Corner Table, asks if people who go out to dinner "want TV in the background."

Which raises a natural question: How do we turn her off?

Travelers' photos

The Record continues to run a full page of photos readers take on vacation, as long as they are shown holding up a copy of the Travel section (T-2).

Putting aside how that cuts down on consumer-oriented travel news, how long are we going to be treated to the spectacle of overweight readers going on all-you-can-eat cruises?

Break up the Port Authority and impeach Christie

Luxury apartments on Palisade Avenue -- among hundreds built in recent years downtown and along Route 4 in Englewood -- have done little to turn around the fortunes of local merchants and restaurant owners. Now, Hackensack hopes hundreds of new apartment tenants will revive its economically depressed Main Street.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

An editorial and a Margulies cartoon in The Record today continue to nibble away at the notion that Governor Christie caused four days of gridlock at the Fort Lee end of the George Washington Bridge.

The goal was to get back at the borough's Democratic mayor for not supporting Christie's re-election (O-2).

Why wait for the conclusions of three inquiries -- in the state Assembly and U.S. Senate, as well as by the Port Authority's inspector general -- to make fundamental changes in the imperious bi-state transportation agency?

And why wait for the GOP bully to export his war on the middle class to the national political arena and declare in the 2016 race for the White House -- a move The Record's adoring editors, columnists and reporters have been predicting for close to two years?

Dump Christie

Let's get rid of New Jersey's worst governor and the Republicans' Elephant Man now. 

Impeach Christie, who has used lies, insults, bullying and vetoes to get his way with the state Legislature's Democratic majority and to silence his critics.

Spin off PATH

And commuters would cheer breaking up an agency that serves as a patronage mill for Christie and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

Spinning off the PATH rail system and bistate bus operations is the only workable option amid increasing traffic congestion.

No agency that depends so heavily on bridge and tunnel tolls -- and which continues to raise them to fund its capital program -- can be expected to expand rail and bus transit, which are at capacity.

'Character flaws'

In a letter to the editor on Saturday's A-9, Christie supporter David B. Simpson of Tenafly draws parallels between Watergate and Bridgegate:

He notes Richard Nixon was driven from  office because of his "connivance in the coverup of a scandal and his pervasive vindictiveness toward those whom he saw as a political enemies."

"Christie's behavior in regard to the bridge issue is beginning to reflect similar character flaws," Simpson says.

This ramp to the George Washington Bridge's lower-level tollbooths from Fort Lee -- and the lower level itself -- remained clear during four days of so-called gridlock in early September, when two of the borough's access lanes to the upper level were closed by Governor Christie's cronies on the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, purportedly for a "traffic study."

Silly columns

Today's paper carries boring columns from Staff Writers John Cichowski (L-1), Mike Kelly (O-1), Bill Ervolino (BL-3) and Elisa Ung (BL-1), who continues to praise chefs and ignore issues facing restaurant goers.

Travel Editor Jill Schensul has an endless column about her search for a lounge at the airport in Miami, another in a series of pieces where she portrays herself as a jet-lagged klutz (T-1).

Schensul never tells readers that airport lounges now admit so many travelers they resemble crowded bus stations.

Farewell, Barry

In Local, readers learn that Barry Honig, a conservative Republican councilman in Tenafly "departs the council today," but the story doesn't explain why (L-3).

Just when I thought Honig's opposition to extending light-rail service to the wealthy borough was short sighted, The Record reports, likely for the first time, that he is blind. 

Second looks

Three poorly edited briefs caught my eye on Saturday's L-6, raising more questions than they answered, thanks to the inattention of the assignment desk:

Readers don't know whether the primal urge to hunt or unhealthy animal fats killed Kenneth Bigert, 58, a Glen Rock man who was found dead in a wooded area in Mahwah.

The story appeared Saturday, and reported he was found "Saturday" near an old cemetery off Route 202.

Maybe, local obituary writer Jay Levin should try to unravel the mystery of the time element and cause of death.

Dead meat

Bigert was dressed in hunting clothes and carried a hunting license. It is poetic justice that he died, apparently before he could kill any animals?

The paper treats him like so much dead meat, never reporting whether he was a husband, father or son or what he did for a living.

Likely story

Police don't name the moron who claimed his 2007 Range Rover with $8,600 in DJ equipment inside was stolen after he left the engine running and went back into his house in Saddle Brook.

The pricey SUV likely has heated seats and an engine with fuel injection that doesn't require warming up.

Another Christie?

The third item carries this headline: "Wyckoff's new mayor is a Christie."

But it never says whether Douglas J. Christie is a Republican or related to the loud mouth who won a second term as governor on Nov. 5.

Storm coverage

On Saturday's Local front, how does Deputy Assignment Flunky Dan Sforza explain the absence of a "snow tale" from Teaneck, one of the biggest, most diverse communities in Bergen County?