Coverage of Christie is true masturbatory journalism

A Manhattan scene at 9th Avenue and 59th Street.

By Victor E. Sasson
Editor

Can't you just see Washington Correspondent Herb Jackson touching himself as he composed the lead paragraph of his Page 1 story in The Record today on a purported "Christie frenzy"?

This is true masturbatory journalism, where the reporter pulls out all of his rhetorical flourishes, and the hell with the facts.

Is a Time magazine cover that lampoons Christie's weight, plus appearances on a bunch of TV shows, a "frenzy" (A-1)?

Politics ad nauseum

The Record is engaged in its own feeding frenzy on promoting Governor Christie as a presidential candidate in an election that is still three, long years away.

And as they have done since the GOP bully first took office in 2010, Jackson and other reporters, including Charles Stile and Melissa Hayes, conspire with Editor Marty Gottlieb basically to ignore Christie's mean-spirited polices and portray him as "popular," though they never say with whom.

I guess their reasoning is that if The Record constantly calls him "popular," the paper will be "popular," too.

No landslide

Today's front page also discards the fiction that Christie won a second term on Tuesday by a "landslide," as The Record reluctantly acknowledges a "historically low turnout" of 38 percent -- fewer than four out of 10 voters (A-1 and A-8).

The big, black "LANDSLIDE" headline on Wednesday's front page is another case where the pursuit of breaking news ignores reality in a desperate bid to sell newspapers.

Of course, The Record doesn't dare explore what turns off legions of New Jersey voters, fearing its own relentless focus on "politics" over issues may be one of the culprits.

In fact, I can't remember the last time I saw a story exploring voter apathy, which infects every local and state election in New Jersey.

Here's Alfie

On A-21 today, Editorial Page Editor Alfred P. Doblin tackles the subject in a column, calling people who don't vote "losers" and the turnout on Tuesday "pathetic."

He reports "slightly more than 2 million voters cast votes for governor" out of 5,511,048 registered voters in New Jersey.

But even Doblin doesn't know how easy it is to vote, mentioning only "absentee ballots" for people who have physical disabilities or work schedules that prevent them from voting "in person."

The clueless editor doesn't know voters can apply for mail-in ballots that are sent to their homes weeks before the election, and when they cast their ballots, they can mail them back to the Board of Elections.

Here's Kelly

Another candidate for masturbatory journalism today is Mike Kelly, whose Page 1 column invokes the mass shootings of Columbine and Newton in the same breath as the suicide of Richard Shoop, 20, of Teaneck inside Garden State Plaza.

Shoop, who killed himself Monday night or early Tuesday morning in the mall's basement, likely couldn't face another four years of Christie.

Kelly's desperation to get his drivel on Page 1 is evident from concocting such a stretch -- Shoop reportedly didn't intend to hurt anyone but himself  -- and typical of media hype and exaggeration.

As usual, I can't get past Kelly's dated column photo and the shit-eating grin that tells me the veteran reporter knows he can get away with writing any crap he wants since Gottlieb took over as editor.

Two more embarrassing corrections appear on A-2 today -- the misspelling of a high school athlete's name and an inaccurate headline about a council election.

Homeless brats

On the front of Local today, spoiled Paramus Catholic High School students stage their yearly charade of spending a night in a box.

The lead paragraph says the rules were clear -- no food, no cellphones, no going inside -- but not whether they were allowed to bring condoms (L-1).

On L-3, a photo of Paterson cops attending a "Blue Mass" to honor fallen officers doesn't mention whether a mass will be held for victims of gun violence after Christie slashed state aid and the Silk City was forced to lay off police.

Dissing the elderly

An L-6 story tells readers Deputy Assignment Flunky Dan Sforza is ignoring the struggles of seniors to fill their retirement years with meaningful activities.

James Parham, 75, of Englewood pleaded guilty after he was arrested for allegedly pimping "mostly young women with crack cocaine habits to some of his younger neighbors."

Thai-ing one on 

In Better Living, Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung didn't stray far from the Woodland Park newsroom to appraise Imocha, a Thai restaurant in the township (BL-18).

Many Bergen County readers won't bother, wondering why Ung doesn't mention any of the great salads or the abundance of vegetables and fresh herbs that Wondee's in Hackensack and other great Thai restaurants are known for.

Second look

A third candidate for masturbatory journalism is Road Warrior John Cichowski, who is so full of himself he can't get anything right.

In his effort to write three columns a week, Cichowski will literally make it up as he goes along, and bend the facts to fit whatever theme he chooses.

In his Sunday column, he misstated the towing charges on the New Jersey Turnpike, as a concerned reader notes on the Facebook page for Road Warrior Bloopers:

More Road Warrior errors and exaggeration

In his Wednesday column on pedestrian death, Cichowski reported there were 402 such deaths from 2009-11, when the actual number was 441, as stated in the New Jersey State Police fatality reports he rewrites every year.

His column also claimed pedestrian deaths remain high and have not declined, as road deaths have.

But he ignores that "actual pedestrian deaths declined by 20 percent from the mid-1990s to 2011, and are on track this year to be the lowest total ever recorded in New Jersey by a wide margin," according to a concerned reader who fact-checks the Road Warrior column and maintains the bloopers page on Facebook.