Rubbing salt in drivers' wounds

Image by chadedwardus via Flickr

The eternal debate: With a soft fish taco, are two tortillas better than one?

Why did Editor Francis Scandale put a large photo of a laughing hyena on the front page today under this headline:

Oil CEOs

flogged over

gas prices

Doesn't look like much of a flogging. In fact, ExxonMobil's chairman and CEO seems to be laughing at the Democratic senators who called him to testify on a bill to repeal billions of dollars in tax breaks.

You can't touch me, he's saying. He's also laughing all the way to the bank with the billions gouged from drivers who are paying around $4 for a gallon of regular.

Third-class journalism

The rest of A-1 in The Record of Woodland Park is filled with stories that just a few years ago would have struggled to make the front of the Local news section:

You have to be desperate to lead the paper with alleged exam rule violations in only eight of the many hundreds of schools in New Jersey.

Horse racetracks taken over by private interests? Who cares?

A dated account of flooding in Alabama by a volunteer from Ridgefield Park? Pretty pathetic for the front page.

No end in sight

Is there no limit to the number of Road Warrior columns on long lines at the Motor Vehicle Commission (L-1)? John Cichowski's work is being compared to journalism in underdeveloped countries.

The lead paragraph of a story on the first Business page reports Governor Christie "regaled" 300 Chinese-Americans "with tales of how he tackled New Jersey's fiscal crisis" -- code for cutting programs that helped middle- and working-class residents while pandering to his millionaire supporters (L-7).

El Caney lives

My report that a small Cuban takeout joint in Bergenfield has gone out of business is incorrect.

Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung reports in the Second Helpings blog that El Caney moved across the street, something not evident when I drove past the old place recently.

Still, when I want Cuban food, I'll be heading for Casual Habana Cafe on Main Street in Hackensack.

In today's review of Red Hen Bistro in Wood-Ridge, Ung gives me no credit for improving the soft fish tacos by complaining to the chef when they were served to me last June in brittle, fried taco shells that fell apart (Better Living centerfold).

Now, all Chef Carlos Valdez has to do to make them even more authentic is wrap each taco in two soft tortillas -- not just one.

Breaking news: Warmer weather ahead

Image via Wikipedia

A map of halal restaurants in North Jersey that U.S. Navy Seals reportedly found in Osama bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

Did you hear the earth-shaking news? It's allergy season, The Record of Woodland Park reports in its lead story today. Tomorrow, the lead Page 1 story will look ahead to the arrival of summer.

It can't be too busy at the Bergen County Courthouse, if Staff Writer Kibret Markos had time to put together a detailed story with two sidebars on a nearly 20-year-old murder case (A-1). 

But he assumes readers have been following the story as closely as he has, so they have to turn to the continuation page to find out if the trial is over or not (A-6).

Osama bin Kelly

Pakistan's prime minister denies that any official was complicit in hiding Osama bin Laden (A-9).

Readers have yet to hear the same denial from Editor Francis Scandale, who seems to be protecting several incompetent reporters and columnists on his staff -- including John Brennan, Mike Kelly, John Cichowski and Bill Ervolino.

Adieu to Christie?

Many journalists are salivating over the possibility they'll able to lampoon Donald Trump, if he runs for president. 

Most New Jersey residents are hoping Governor Christie will follow Trump's lead, so the state can begin a healing process (A-10, L-1).

The big news from Hackensack today is the refiling of a sex-harassment suit in state court by a police officer who saw her claims dismissed by a federal judge (L-3).

Throwing vegetarians a bone

For several years, Better Living's carnivorous editors ran a single recipe for vegetarians on Mondays, and now the first full-fledged story quotes only those who eat meat occasionally (F-1). 

And during those years of token coverage, several vegetarians on the staff -- led by Travel Editor Jill Schensul -- must have been regarded as freaks, instead of as sources for a story on that lifestyle.

Kiss of death

Less than a month after Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung gushed about El Caney, the tiny Cuban takeout joint in Bergenfield is out of business. I saw a big "FOR RENT" sign on Monday.

Ung never explained why she devoted her entire Sunday restaurant column to this culinary pipsqueak or why she gave more ink to a takeout shack that had been featured a year earlier in the paper's own Marketplace column.

When I visited on April 22, El Caney was out of several menu items and had no whole fish. Portions were small.

Although the food was good, it didn't approach the quality of the many meals I enjoyed over the years at Migdalia's Cuban Cafe before the Bergenfield restaurant closed and the owner-chef moved to Miami.