Christie the bully ensures his survival, not ours

After a breather on Monday and Tuesday, the first two days of Passover, the New Jersey entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel was as congested as ever this morning.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

As New Jersey goes down the tubes, Governor Christie is spending more and more time raising money to ensure his political future.

Today and Wednesday, The Record's front page reports about contributions to the Republican Governors Association, which Christie heads and which he credits with electing him in 2009 to his first term.

On Wednesday, the Woodland Park daily reported that the law firm of Gibson Dunn gave $10,000 to the group, nine days before its lawyers issued a reporting clearing Christie of any wrongdoing in the George Washington Bridge lane closures (A-1).

That self-serving whitewash will cost taxpayers as much as $1 million, according to media reports.

Drug deal

Today, the paper reports the GOP bully appeared at a groundbreaking for Celgene, a drug company that donated $26,00o last year to the RGA (A-1).

The year before, the drug company hired Rich Bagger, a former Christie chief of staff, as senior vice president.

Then, Christie named Bagger to the Port Authority's board of commissioners. And in 2013, Bagger gave $10,000 to the RGA.

All of this really stinks.

Where's the fire?

Why does anybody move into Elmwood Park, where liquor is served at the borough's firehouses and where a reportedly intoxicated fireman crashed a ladder truck into utility poles (A-1)?

Today's Page 1 story doesn't say whether the borough has a volunteer or professional fire department, but it mentions that River Edge ended and Lodi restricts firehouse drinking (A-8).

I'm a pretty close reader of the Local news section, and have been for years, and can't recall every reading a story about firehouses that serve liquor.

What exactly are the local-news editors doing?

Horsing around

As the onetime owner of a 1966 Ford Mustang GT, I enjoyed the Better Living cover story on the iconic car's 50th anniversary (BL-1).

But what was the point of running two photos of owner John Pestrichelli of River Edge and his 1973 Mustang, especially the shocking shot of the grossly overweight man behind the wheel on BL-3?

Two other photos of a second Mustang owner also run with the story. Couldn't the editors find four different Mustang owners?

And the story deserves a less-amateurish headline then: 

"A PONY WITH

 GIDDYUP"