Gluttony, inebriation, human trafficking and brain injuries

After the train passed and the gates went up, the driver of this minivan continued down Euclid Avenue to Grand Avenue and right through the stop sign without slowing or stopping, a common occurrence in Hackensack.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

Today's post-Christmas edition of The Record is pretty ho-hum.

On Page 1, Columnist Mike Kelly rehashes a major episode in New Jersey corruption from the late 1970s and early 1980s that most people have long forgotten. (A-1).

Kelly claims another crappy Hollywood movie -- short on facts and long on fabrication -- "renews old questions about Abscam."

For whom? Surely not readers. 

Here's a second column in a row where Kelly rehashes a major event from the distant past, basically telling readers he can't be bothered doing the legwork and forming opinions on an important issue that affects them today.

Back to school

Also on Page 1, a photo of Barbara Taylor Rosser teaching students about Kwanzaa is likely the first time in many years The Record actually covered anything going on in a Hackensack  classroom (A-1).

On A-15, another pope offered annual Christmas wishes for a better world, but Governor Christie is the kind of Catholic who will answer that prayer by making the world better for him, his family and his wealthy supporters, and to hell with the middle class.

With little else of interest in today's paper, I wondered what I had missed recently.

Sports lessons

On Wednesday's Local front, law enforcement officials in Indianapolis and New Orleans, the two most recent Super Bowl hosts, warned New Jersey officials "to expect a rise in prostitution and the recruitment of teenage boys and girls into the sex trade."

Isn't pro football a great sport? 

Add human trafficking to all the other wonderful features of the sport: 

Tailgate gluttony, a culture of inebriation in the stadium and wealthy team owners who pay athletes millions of dollars a year, then turn their backs on those who suffer traumatic brain injuries.

That's why many call it the Super Toilet Bowl.

Houlton follies

Just about the clunkiest photo over line and headline of the year appeared on the Local front last Sunday:

POSTAL SERVICE POWERS UP  TO HOLIDAY SPEED

Teterboro center gets 'normal'

"Gets normal"? What the hell does that mean, Production Editor Liz Houlton?

Ex-detective cleared

In the Dec. 20 edition of the weekly Hackensack Chronicle, a story by Record Staff Writer Hannan Adely reports retired police Detective Kenneth Martin has been cleared of charges he stole his opponents' campaign signs when he ran for the City Council.

Martin had been convicted of theft on Aug. 1 in Municipal Court and fined $150 on the basis of a surveillance video.

But a Superior Court judge threw out the conviction "because authorities were unable to vouch for the authenticity of the video" from a surveillance camera at Hackensack Market on Passaic Street, Martin's lawyer said.