Editors gush over inanimate objects

Was any of this restaurant meat raised on antibiotics and other harmful additives? Don't expect a heads-up from Staff Writer Elisa Ung, The Record's restaurant reviewer.

The Record's front page today is dominated by a Manhattan skyscraper that is still under construction and photographs that, frankly, are far from impressive.

The front of Local is dominated by Columnist Mike Kelly getting off on what he calls "a rock," as only this good Catholic could.

Above that L-1 text-and-photo package, readers get the latest news on sidewalk ramps.

Newsroom infestation

And as if the front of the local-news section couldn't get any weirder, Road Warrior John Cichowski selects the rare closure of a rail station from lice for his column on commuting problems.

It's another dull Sunday edition from Editor Marty Gottlieb and head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes, who continues to throw crumbs to Hackensack readers looking for news.

On L-6 today, the lack of information in a Hackensack stabbing story may be due to police officers punishing The Record for its overwhelmingly favorable coverage of the defense being mounted by suspended Police Chief Ken Zisa, who is on trial in Superior Court.

Burying a lively obit

All this brick-and-mortar "news" is front and center, but a local obituary on "a lively redhead," Eileen Demarest of Bloomingdale, is buried on L-3.

Here's a great line: "The closest Eileen came to fishing was opening a can of tuna." 

 
Two Kelly columns

Is this the first time Kelly has had two columns in one edition (L-1 and O-1)?

The Opinion piece scolding Governor Christie for his big mouth exposes Kelly's disdain for unions, but I question why it isn't on Page 1 today.

More copy desk errors

On A-6 today, the caption with the photo of Holy Cross Cemetery in North Arlington is wrong on two scores:

The cemetery is in Bergen County -- not "Hudson County" -- and readers can see at least 10 buildings in Manhattan, not "the few New York skyline structures" described so stiffly in the caption. 

"New York skyline structures ... "? Who the hell wrote that and who approved it?

Dining-out follies

Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung really lets down readers today with her Sunday column on restaurant food that doesn't live up to its billing on menus (The Corner Table, F-1).

The real concern is not whether fish is "fresh." The most important things customers want to know is whether fish is wild-caught and sustainable or farm-raised.

"Aged" beef? Who cares? 

How many times has Ung willingly conspired with a chef by praising an outrageously expensive steak that was raised on harmful antibiotics, growth hormones and animal byproducts (bits of dead animals)?

She couldn't care less. The paper is paying for all the food she reviews, including those artery clogging desserts she crams down her gaping maw.

And she probably feeds leftovers from her restaurant meals to her husband and child, firm in the knowledge that all of them will live forever.

Editions I missed

Image by stephenhanafin via Flickr

On Tuesday, Sept. 14, The Record and Columnist Mike Kelly continued their Page 1 smear campaign against the imam who is behind the proposed mosque near Ground Zero. I can't recall any stories about other apartment landlords in North Jersey, including those who own buildings in Paterson and Passaic.


I also can't recall any stories smearing the shore rabbi who is at the center of the biggest corruption scandal in New Jersey history -- the one that brought down numerous officials, including the cocky young mayor of Hoboken -- or the paper railing against the synagogue he is affiliated with. Is Kelly targeting the imam because he is Muslim?

Just below Kelly's diatribe is an A-1 story on Governor Christie's cuts to after-school programs for 9,000 children of the working poor. Shame on Christie, who continues to live large and cater to such millionaires as the Borgs and his rich, fat-cat supporters.

In Local, a family with seven dogs continues getting better coverage than many towns, and photos are blown up as big as possible to take up the space of local news that was never filed.

I have two problems with Sachi Fujimori's Better Living story on sustainable seafood. Recommending big-eye and albacore tuna flies in the face of everything I've read about high mercury levels in those fish. 

And while Costco's sources for farmed fish are condemned by Greenpeace, the warehouse store gets no credit for selling a wide variety of fresh and frozen wild-caught fish and other seafood.

On Sunday, Sept. 12, free-spending food writer Elisa Ung recommends "gourmet" takeout dinners for $10.95 to $14.95, some of them frozen. I will match the restaurant-quality takeout dinners from Jerry's Gourmet & More in Englewood ($6.99) against any of them.  And I'll give you a piece of sound advice she neglects: Plate your food and heat it in the microwave; don't reheat food in plastic takeout containers.

(Photo: Manhattan and New Jersey.)