Seniors see sunlight, crime as local news and more

Gen. Enoch Poor, a Revolutionary War hero, died in Hackensack on Sept. 8, 1780, and was buried two days later at the First Reformed Church on Court Street, above, with full military honors and with Gen. George Washington, Lafayette and other senior military leaders in attendance. Today, his spirit lives on a couple of blocks away in General Poor's Tavern on Main Street, below.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Record today publishes a rare photo of Senior Bergenitis, a species that inhabits every corner of Bergen County, but is rarely shown in public.

A Page 1 photo captures sun-splashed "dancers enjoying the song 'Shout' at the Bergen County Senior Citizen Picnic" on Tuesday in a Paramus park (A-1 and L-3).

The Woodland Park daily often portrays seniors as little more than inhabitants of nursing homes and critical-care facilities, and generally turns a blind eye to age discrimination in the workplace and in the media.

You have read far more about autism than Alzheimer's disease in The Record.

The paper's chief restaurant reviewer has eaten tons of butter and sugar, and its freelancers have published numerous artery clogging recipes of no interest to many seniors.

It's hard to understand how The Record generally ignores seniors when this is the group with all the money.

People over 55 buy the most cars, and travel lavishly. Yet, coverage is aimed at the young, who don't even read the paper.

Local crime news

Peter J. Sampson, the hard-working Bergen County Courthouse reporter, has three bylines on the Local front today, part of an onslaught of Law & Order news throughout the section.

With 70 towns in Bergen County alone, you'd think the lazy local assignment editors could come up with more municipal news, such as the impact on residents and businesses of all the tax-exempt property in Hackensack.

Evidently, Editors Deirdre Sykes and Dan Sforza are bored with their jobs. 

The same could be said for Liz Houlton, the six-figure production editor who allows numerous errors, bad captions and clunky headlines to get into the paper.

Publisher Stephen A. Borg could cut those three, and save a ton of money.

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It's not enough to criticize the PA behemoth from afar

The Record has written thousands of words criticizing the Port Authority Bus Terminal in midtown Manhattan, but no reporter has actually boarded a bus to the city or joined the long lines of home-bound commuters who face delays on the platforms, where spring-loaded seating resembles a torture device outlawed by the Geneva Convention, above.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

How does a North Jersey newspaper cover the region's crowded public transit system?

If you are Editor Marty Gottlieb of The Record, you buy into what the lazy local assignment editors have done for decades:

You send reporters to cover the meetings of the mass-transit agencies, including NJ Transit and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

In recent months, thousands of critical words about the antiquated Port Authority Bus Terminal in midtown Manhattan have merely parroted complaining letters to the editor, a state legislative hearing and the experiences of the bi-state agency's new chairman.

Rouse et al.

Commuters will cheer news the Port Authority board on Wednesday voted to approve $90 million in emergency repairs this year (A-1).

But that emergency spending could have come a lot sooner, if only the paper's transportation reporters actually rode mass transit and reported on the quality of the service, as the New York papers did for years with their subway columns.

A couple of years ago, Staff Writer Karen Rouse did report firsthand on the afternoon stampede for trains at New York's Penn Station, but Rouse apparently has never actually tried to get a seat on a city bound train or bus during the morning rush hour.

She also refused to ride the decrepit local buses in North Jersey -- relied on mostly by people who can't afford cars -- in the years before NJ Transit replaced them with new "talking" buses.

Boburg, Cichowski, Sforza

Shawn Boburg, who covers the Port Authority, has never reported on the need to expand the PATH commuter rail system or the reverse bus lane into the Lincoln Tunnel -- two parts of his beat.

The befuddled Road Warrior, John Cichowski, is hopelessly lost in the suburbs, and the so-called commuting column he has written for more than a decade has been taken hostage by drivers whose sanity is questionable. 

Anti-transit reporting

Of course, none of this is a surprise to readers who remember long, anti-light rail stories aimed at Englewood and Tenafly readers from then-reporter Tom Davis that were ordered by Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza, himself a failed transportation reporter.

Lines of home-bound commuters are as long as ever at the Manhattan hub, but the Port Authority did install touch-screen terminals on the main level that show bus routes and, more importantly for occasional users, the number of the gate where they can catch a bus.

I haven't seen that improvement reported in The Record.

Today, an editorial on the new Port Authority chairman, John Degnan, and emergency terminal repairs is careful to avoid reviewing all that Governor Christie has done to hurt mass transit (A-12).

Forgotten responsibility

I chuckled at Boburg's lead paragraph this morning:

"For years, the Port Authority Bus Terminal in midtown Manhattan has seemed frozen in time, a forgotten giant in the agency's vast portfolio of transportation facilities" (A-1).

Indeed. The terminal has long been forgotten in the Hackensack and Woodland Park newsrooms, too.

More corrections

Three long corrections appear on A-2 today, including a rare error in a local obituary.

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These editors again fail to deliver hometown news

The quality of life in North Jersey -- including aircraft noise over Hackensack and other towns near Teterboro and Newark airports, above, or gaping potholes that damage car tires and wheels -- are of no interest to the editors of The Record's Local news section who appear to spend most of their time reading tabloids in the newsroom toilet.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

I'm shocked by the amount of Law & Order news in The Record's Local section today and Friday.

Police, fire, accident and court news and photos dominate almost every page.

But readers also find stories about the police, including Friday's report on raises for the Pal Park chief and today's solemn piece on a vigil for Daniel Breslin, the hospitalized Bergen County police officer who was severely injured by an allegedly drunk driver (A-1 and L-1).

Sforza stumbles

Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza was so desperate to fill his pages today he ran a freelance shot of a Route 80 accident in Hackensack from inside the photographer's car (L-3).

Now that's chintzy hometown news coverage. Still, Sforza stands proud, shouting, Who says we don't cover Hackensack? 

Sforza's stumbling around for the last several months would seem to call for the return of head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes after a prolonged convalescence.

On vacation?

When is the last time readers saw Hannan Adely's byline on a Hackensack story? Has she been reassigned, sent to cover the Syrian civil war or what?

On Friday, the weekly Hackensack Chronicle reported the City Council on Monday night approved a $760,000 bond ordinance to repave streets and perform related work.

After the meeting, resident Steven Gelber's Hackensack Scoop blog reported that Mayor John Labrosse announced former campaign manager Thom Ammirato will no longer be writing press releases for the mayor or Deputy Mayor Katherine Canestrino.

But Labrosse said Ammirato's salary of $6,500 a month wouldn't be adjusted at this time, Gelber reported.

Following Gelber's lead, Adely of The Record has reported that Ammirato also has a full-time position with Bergen County, and serves as public relations consultant to at least three Republicans in the state Legislature.

But the Woodland Park daily hasn't reported on this latest wrinkle in the Ammirato story or approval of the street-paving bond ordinance.

The woefully short list of streets listed in the Chronicle story continues to omit Euclid Avenue, between Prospect and Summit avenues, a potholed block that hasn't been repaved for decades. 

Euclid Avenue potholes, above and below.

Friday's Record

Editor Marty Gottlieb led Friday's paper with a long report on the incredible mess Governor Christie has made of road, highway and mass-transit improvements by refusing to hike the low gasoline tax to fund them.

This is basically a four-year-old story The Record has ignored until now, especially increasingly congested traffic, and crowded trains and buses.

Barf bags

In Better Living, Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung pans Port of Call American Fusion Buffet and Sushi in Hackensack.

Still, she feels it necessary to tell readers the all-you-can eat format "would be good for people with big appetites."

The data box on Friday's BL-18 lists only four recommended dishes, two of them desserts, but omits other dishes Ung praised in the text. 

Did anyone edit the piece?

Today's paper

Gottlieb's Page 1 today includes another story on the agonizingly slow investigative and legal process in the wake of January's explosive revelations in the George Washington Bridge scandal.

Since members of the GOP bully's inner circle in Trenton and at the Port Authority admitted they orchestrated four days of gridlock in Democratic Fort Lee, all readers have seen are firings and resignations, and targets lawyering up and taking the Fifth.

Christie himself hired a friendly law firm at taxpayers' expense to produce a whitewash declaring the governor had no knowledge or involvement in the lane closures.

Other stories and columns appear designed to help Christie repair his battered image (A-3).

The slow legal process is designed to ensure greedy lawyers who charge exorbitant hourly rates will walk away with literally millions of dollars in fees no matter who is found to be at fault for an apparent pattern of political retribution.

Paramus woes

Today's front page also includes a story on a "big change for Paramus," which has eased rules on retail signs along Routes 4 and 17.

This piece continues The Record's ad-fueled focus on major retail chains over Main Street merchants.

The last story on local merchants reported on a few record stores, as in those selling vinyl recordings, and continued to ignore struggling downtowns in Hackensack, Englewood, Teaneck and other towns.

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Bergen's Keystone Kops are alive and well

More than 50 years after the invention of the turn lane, none exist on Passaic Street at Summit Avenue in Hackensack, meaning drivers behind a turning vehicle feel lucky if they can squeeze through on the right, above. Often, they can't.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Two days after an undercover cop was shot in a Garfield pot sting that went awry, a big photo of plainclothes officers at the suspects' court hearing appears on the front page of The Record today.

Let's hope none of the cops in the photo are actually working undercover or the photo makes their future effectiveness questionable (A-1 and A-6).

Only four days earlier, Page 1 reported that a Bergen County police officer was hospitalized in critical condition after an allegedly drunk driver crashed into the back of his marked vehicle, which was stopped in the right travel lane of Route 46 in Lodi.

Good police work?

Are these two examples of misplaced police priorities, and a cop who didn't know enough to pull his vehicle onto the shoulder to avoid a drunk who used the vehicles flashing emergency lights as a target?

Even civilians know enough to pull ahead of a vehicle stopped on the shoulder of a highway to avoid just such an eventuality. 

So far, The Record hasn't reported whether the cop was following procedure.

Heroin, not pot

The Woodland Park daily also conveniently ignores its own series of stories in 2013 on a heroin epidemic in Bergen County, and four dramatic ads paid for by Prosecutor John L. Molinelli, sounding an alarm in March over the rise of opiate addiction and heroin overdoses, and announcing stepped-up enforcement.

But the undercover operation at the center of Tuesday's shooting in Garfield was a $400 purchase of marijuana, not heroin.

Is stopping the distribution of marijuana really worth endangering the lives of an undercover police officer and Walmart shoppers?

Wasting tax dollars

Boy. If you wonder why our property taxes are so high, just look at Wednesday's Page 1 photo, showing at least 18 police officers, standing around and bullshitting in the shopping center parking lot in the aftermath of the shooting.

Don't they have anything else to do, like chase the suspects? 

And I'll bet all of their marked and unmarked gas guzzlers are running, wasting precious tax dollars and polluting the air. 

Maybe some of those idle officers could be used to boost DWI patrols and catch allegedly repeat drunk drivers like Michael Ettz, the high school teacher who slammed into the county police car.

No father figure

Wednesday's front page also carried a hilarious story on Governor Christie being named "a Father of the Year by the National Father's Day Committee," whatever that is.

Melissa Hayes, the adoring reporter who is assigned to cover the GOP bully, doesn't mention the contradiction of a doting father who treats middle- and working-class state residents like dirt.

Also on Wednesday, the Better Living cover promoted the expansion of Stickey's BBQ to Hillsdale, where sauces mask the taste of mystery meat and poultry pumped full of harmful animal antibiotics.

Today's paper

Today's coverage of the court hearing for two of the three suspects in the shooting of the undercover cop includes:

• An awkwardly written caption noting that Paramus Police Chief Kenneth Ehrenberg is "addressing the press," using an improper catch-all for print and electronic media (A-6). 

Dissing Hackensack

A brief on Wednesday's Hackensack school board election doesn't say how many residents voted in the election, which was ignored by The Record (L-1).

Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza couldn't rouse himself to actually ask a reporter to do a story on who was running and what they stood for, and Hackensack residents received no mailings from the candidates.

Today's brief notes the $140 million operating budget was approved, and reports for the first time a budget reduction of a half-million dollars will still result in a tax hike.

Zisa allies win

A total of 601 residents voted on the budget, less than half the number that cast votes in last year's school board election.

The four seats were won by allies of the city's former Zisa administration, including Joseph Barreto, a guidance counselor who ran unsuccessfully for City Council last May.

The highest vote-getter received 490 votes in a city with more than 19,000 registered voters.

Tabloid editor

It's clear municipal news isn't a priority for Sforza, the lazy editor who has taken over for boss Deirdre Sykes during her prolonged sick leave.

Today's Local section is filled with tabloid news, starting with the lead story on a Paterson man imprisoned for raping his daughter and fathering four children with her.

A road-rage story also appears on L-1.

And L-2 carries another sensational account, this one about a Hawthorne cardiologist accused of fondling patients.

Of course, cardiologists assigned to North Jersey heart-surgery units are cheering the news of Stickey's BBQ opening in Hillsdale, and a potential increase in patients.

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New Page 1 errors, bird shit and drug-filled ham

Hackensack residents awoke on Wednesday morning to find a crusty layer of snow covering their solar panels, above, and car windshields.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Page 1 is often considered the most important in a newspaper, but at The Record, you're as likely to find serious errors there as on any other page.

Today, a front-page photo caption contains a boneheaded mistake, and Mike Kelly's Page 1 column on the Boston Marathon bombing brings a dead cop back to life. (A-1 and A-7).

Wrecking a story

The A-1 photo caption claims "demolition began Tuesday on LG Electronics buildings in Englewood Cliffs" (A-1).

That's ridiculous. 

The demolition -- to make way for a new, taller headquarters on the east side of Sylvan Avenue, atop the Palisades -- was of vacant buildings "where LG plans to build its new North American headquarters," as the story on L-1 reports in the first paragraph.

The Record's reporters and editors have written so many stories about LG's controversial plan they don't even bother to say precisely where the new building will be located or what was there before, leading to the kind of serious error that appears on Page 1 today.

And, it appears, six-figure Production Editor Liz Houlton no longer has her staff proof Page 1 before it goes to press or after the paper is printed.  

Readers' marathon

Readers can only hope Kelly stays in Boston after covering the anniversary of the Boston Marathon bombing (A-1).

Forget about his monotonous first paragraph, where he uses the verb "gaze" for perhaps the thousandth time.

On the continuation page, Kelly reports "relatives of the three spectators who perished ... and a police officer who was fatally shot later in a confrontation with the alleged bombers visited the finish line" (A-7).

Of course, the dead cop is still in his grave. 

But no one caught this mistake -- not the assignment editor who read it first or the news editor who made up the page or the copy editor who supposedly edited the story or the supervisor of the copy desk who supposedly went over his or her work, and approved it for publication.

Parking-lot news

What are two photos showing a man with homing pigeons, all from Stony Point, N.Y., doing on L-3 today, in the Local news section?

They happen to be in the parking lot of 1 Garret Mountain Plaza, and in the background, readers can see the nondescript office building the Woodland Park daily has called home since leaving Hackensack in 2009.

Gee whiz. I guess Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza didn't have any legitimate municipal news for his section today. 

Did that lazy editor send a photographer to the parking lot for a shitty "story" about flying birds?

Shameless plug

A day after Better Living editors debuted a "health page" with a strong focus on food, a story on Easter Brunch today recommends readers buy a smoked ham that is apparently filled with harmful preservatives and animal antibiotics (BL-1).

The piece, by a free-lancer, is a shameless plug for a single pork store in Fair Lawn, and doesn't mention readers can buy uncured, naturally raised hams at Whole Foods Market, Trader Joe's and other stores that would be a lot better for them.

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Columnists make fools of themselves on Page 1

Before and after a crew patched potholes at Euclid and Prospect avenues in Hackensack, above and below. The private contractor spent the entire day Monday repairing only two blocks of Prospect between Ross Avenue and Clinton Place.

The severely pockmarked pavement along the blocks of Prospect Avenue lined by high-rises wasn't touched on Monday.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

I'd be surprised if more than a few dozen commuters from Bergen and Passaic counties drive past the Lincoln Tunnel and use the Holland Tunnel to enter one of the world's most-congested cities.

But here is Staff Writer John Cichowski of The Record, also known as the demented Road Warrior, wasting his and readers' time with a Page 1 column today on the Pulaski Skyway, the elevated roadway that reaches a choke-point at the old, two-lane tube to Manhattan.

The drop headline on A-1 asks if the gasoline tax is the best way to fund future road repairs and mass-transit improvements.

But Cichowski's dementia took hold, and readers who stick with this column to the bitter end on A-6 never find the answer.

Commuters in Bergen and Passaic counties would much rather see more stories and columns on whether any improvements are planned at the congested Port Authority Bus Terminal, where bus riders encounter long lines and the lack of such basic comforts as benches.

Or, whether any widening projects are planned for such antiquated roads as Passaic Street in Rochelle Park, Maywood and Hackensack, a major thoroughfare that is often backed up behind turning vehicles.

Ruining Rooney

The other fool on Page 1 today is Columnist Bill Ervolino, who can't help reminding readers he once interviewed actor Mickey Rooney, 93, who died on Sunday after a show-business career of nearly nine decades (A-1).

Ervolino reaches back 21 years, and makes a "short joke" at Rooney's expense, noting the actor was seated on a couch, but that his "sneakers" only occasionally touched "the ground" (the carpet in the actor's hotel room). 

Who gives a shit that the unfunniest man at The Record once interviewed Rooney?

Does anyone understand the densely written story on Verizon's high-speed internet service or what is at stake for consumers from the first few long paragraphs on the front page today (A-1)?

More accident news

Two traffic accidents, one of them fatal, dominate the front of Local today as Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza seems to be relying more and more on crash coverage to fill out his thin local report (L-1).

The stories don't answer readers' questions on the cause of the accidents, even though the fatal crash occurred more than three days ago.

The reporter who went to the funeral home for the wake of Nick Romano, 17, couldn't reach the Wayne Police Department's Traffic Bureau on Monday (L-1), and the investigating prosecutor apparently wouldn't talk to her.

The second accident involved a tanker truck that flipped on Monday at 3 in the morning on Route 287 near Mahwah, injuring the driver, who wasn't identified (L-1).

The photo caption notes 2,000 gallons of milk spilled from the tanker, but doesn't say whether 12 ounces of coffee would have prevented the accident.

More highway related news appears on L-2, where a photo shows a brush fire on Route 17, near Route 80, in Lodi. Gee whiz.

A story and photo reports Paterson is having financial problems from the extra cost of removing snow and patching potholes, but where is the story about Hackensack and other Bergen communities who are in the same boat (L-3)?

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The Record's telephone reporting cheats readers

On Wednesday morning, I saw freshly patched potholes on Prospect Avenue in Hackensack, near the Camelot high-rise, but Euclid and Prospect avenues, above, looked like this on Wednesday afternoon and today.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

A front-page headline in The Record today declares, "It's too soon to assess health law."

But Staff Writer Colleen Diskin, one of the least productive veterans in the Woodland Park newsroom, apparently did her news gathering with a telephone and a computer.

Diskin and her assignment editor saw no need for the reporter to leave the building and interview North Jersey residents in search of answers to all of the questions the story raises  (A-1 and A-8).

"Time will tell if it lowers

costs, adds subscribers"

That's the awkward sub-headline on the story, which cites "a paucity of data on a number of key questions."

Gee. What about going to a mall, and interviewing people who signed up for coverage under the Affordable Care Act, and seeking answers to those "key questions"?

That's Reporting 101. This tortured story cheats readers.

To complicate things, the story is labeled an "ANALYSIS," and filled with talking heads -- so-called experts and others who caution against drawing quick conclusions. 

One source's title consumes three lines on the continuation page.

Money talks

The Supreme Court has reaffirmed that money talks, freeing wealthy donors to give to as many political candidates and campaigns as they want (A-1).

An editorial appears to be displeased with the high court declaring that campaign contributions are a form of "free speech" (A-18).

But The Record covered Governor Christie's last campaign against Democrat Barbara Buono based almost totally on how much money each candidate raised.

The editors anointed Christie, who had a huge lead in fund-raising, as the winner months before the November election.

Sloppy reporting

In many cases, Buono's campaign appearances were buried inside the paper, while Christie hogged Page 1 time and again.

Somehow, the Christie-loving editors, columnists and reporters never discovered just how desperate the GOP bully was, judging from this year's allegations of political retribution against Democrats who refused to endorse him for a second term.

For example, another Page 1 story today reports state employees sought Christie campaign endorsements from the same public officials they worked with in their taxpayer-funded jobs (A-1).

The Tesla Model S, an all-electric, four-door luxury sedan. The company is fighting a proposed ban on direct sales in New Jersey.

Law & Order

For the third or fourth day in a row, Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza relies heavily on police, fire and court news to flesh out another thin local report (L-1, L-2, L-3 and L-6).

Instead of running a photo of a traffic jam caused by the lack of mass transit, Sforza runs a photo of a fuel spill in Fair Lawn that tied up traffic in several towns, thanks to our antiquated road system (L-2).

In Tuesday's Road Warrior column on L-1, Staff Writer John Cichowski made major errors in reprising parts of an interim state report on the benefits of red-light cameras.

See the Facebook page for Road Warrior Bloopers:

DOT makes a fool of the Road Warrior

Cheap reporting

The lamest form of business reporting is the anniversary story.

Today, Staff Writer Joan Verdon profiles Tony Conza, who copied an Italian hero sandwich and helped start the Blimpie fast-food chain 50 years ago (L-7).

Why waste the space? It's not as if Blimpie's low-quality, preservative-filled cold cuts broke any new nutritional ground.

In other business news, California-based Tesla is appealing the state Motor Vehicle Commission's decision to bar direct sale of the all-electric Model S after April 15 (L-8).

Tesla has showrooms in Paramus and Short Hills.

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Our bankrupt state, towns can't fix potholes

All of the pothole photos on today's post were taken on Tuesday on one block of Euclid Avenue in Hackensack, above and below. Drivers who took the George Washington Bridge exit for the Palisades Interstate Parkway on Tuesday encountered a minefield of potholes between the bridge and Exit 1 in Englewood Cliffs that were so numerous, they could not steer around them.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

Our state and our towns appear to be so broke they cannot afford to fix potholes -- nasty reminders of the bitter winter we barely survived.

After a flurry of columns and stories, The Record has been ignoring the increasing number of potholes and the rising chorus of curses from drivers, as well as the lack of repairs.

Up close and personal on Euclid Avenue in Hackensack.

The front page today carries another story on the state's severe financial problems under Governor Christie, the GOP bully who refuses to raise taxes on millionaires and throws away hundreds of millions more on tax breaks for wealthy business owners (A-1).

Christie also has refused to raise the low gasoline tax, which could revive the bankrupt Transportation Trust Fund, which is used to repair potholes on Route 4, Route 17 and other state highways.

Zisa Family Memorial Potholes on Euclid Avenue in Hackensack, above and below. Members of the current City Council argue they can't afford fix streets because of all of the financial problems caused by the former administration, allied with the Zisas, who ruled Hackensack for decades. Those problems range from millions of dollars lost because bills were never sent out to many more millions of dollars spent to defend and settle lawsuits against Ken Zisa, the former police chief who was convicted of official misconduct and insurance fraud.

Today's paper

President Obama says 7.1 million Americans signed up for health coverage, and that "doesn't include enrollments through 14 state exchanges or people who started the process and weren't able to finish because of technical problems," according to today's Page 1 story.

"The Affordable Health Care Act is here to stay," Obama said.

Let's hope The Record's negative coverage isn't here to stay.

The Woodland Park daily and its medical writers virtually ignored any success stories, including reporting on people who saved money by signing up for federal health care.

The federal program is expected to lower health-care costs, as well as depress the profits of the insurance companies who have donated millions of dollars to the GOP's disinformation and repeal campaign.

Exploding cars

Readers who remember exploding Ford Pintos and Crown Victoria Police Interceptors or Toyota vehicles that accelerated out of control aren't surprised by today's front-page report on cost-cutting at General Motors that killed at least 13 people (A-1).

On A-2 today, the editors correct two of the many reporting, grammatical and other screw-ups that appeared in the paper recently.

Bridgegate costs

A story on A-3 reports state officials don't know how much they will be billed for the self-serving whitewash Governor Christie commissioned to clear him of wrongdoing in the George Washington Bridge lane closures.

Last week, news stories and columns put the damage to taxpayers at $1 million or more. What were they based on?

Christie was skewered on the Bridgegate scandal and his weight at a 90th-birthday roast of Brendan Byrne, a former governor (A-3). 

Of course, as with anything involving Christie, the joke is really on middle-class taxpayers, especially those who gave him a second term in November.

Local news?

On the Local front, an accident photo carries a caption that is unusually complete, including the name of a driver killed by a tractor-trailer on the New Jersey Turnpike (L-1).

But Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza continues to rely too heavily on police and court news to flesh out his thin local-news report.

He still hasn't answered a nagging question on the mind of residents:

Why is no one fixing thousands of annoying and dangerous potholes? 

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Christie may be lying about GWB lane closures

In all of his self-serving statements about the early September George Washington Bridge lane closures in Fort Lee, above, Governor Christie has never spoken under oath. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

The latest developments in the Bridgegate scandal could be a modern spin on the Biblical story of "Samson and De Liar."

"Samson" is Governor Christie's hand-picked Port Authority chairman, David Samson, a powerful New Jersey lawyer who has been called a father figure and mentor to the GOP bully.

After Samson was named to the unsalaried position, his law firm saw a significant increase in fees from lobbying and legal work for developers, NJ Transit and others, WNYC-FM and The Record have reported. 

Christie whitewash

But a day after an "internal" review supposedly cleared Christie of any wrongdoing in the George Washington Bridge lane closures, his Friday news conference brought us no closer to the truth about whether he is "de liar" in everything he's said -- none of it under oath (A-1).

In fact, an "ANALYSIS" on Page 1 today reports "many documents [in the 300-page report] appear to lend at least some credence" to the allegations against Christie (A-1).

Sacrificial officials

Samson resigned Friday, becoming at least the sixth official to take the fall for the governor, whose claim of being lied to by a vindictive staff just doesn't ring true.

The staffer who should resign is Christie's foul-mouthed chief press spokesman, former Star-Ledger reporter Michael Drewniak, a real low-life who made derogatory references to reporters and newspapers covering the scandal.

In reference to Christie's onetime Port Authority crony David Wildstein, Drewniak (rhymes with "maniac") threatened to "claw his eyes out, pour gasoline in the sockets and light them up" (A-6).

But the story and report do not provide any context for the threat.

Wildstein says he told Christie at a 9/11 ceremony in Manhattan about the lane closures as they were happening.

Political payback

Also hard to swallow is the report's claim that Christie "did not create a culture of political retaliation" against Democrats in Fort Lee, Hoboken and Jersey City who refused to endorse his bid for a second term last November.

Let's remember the internal review was led by prominent Republican lawyer Randy Mastro, a $1,000-an-hour practitioner who worked at a discount for Christie, but still managed to roll up a $1 million legal bill to choke taxpayers.

Critics aplenty

The lawyer for Bridget Anne Kelly, who sent the "Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee" e-mail as Christie's deputy chief of staff, blasted the report:

"The report's venomous, gratuitous and inappropriate sexist remarks concerning Ms. Kelly have no place in what is alleged to be a professional and independent report," attorney Michael Critchley said (A-1).

Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer says she's willing to go under oath and repeat her claims that Christie officials threatened Sandy aid money to her city.

The report, she said Thursday, is "a one-sided whitewash of serious misconduct by the Christie administration" that was "sadly predictable" (A-1 on Friday).

That says it all.

Photo puzzle

Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza continues to rely on accident photos and captions that provide no real information to readers, but do fill out his thin local news report (L-1).

A story on five people arrested last Sunday in an assault on a Palisades Park parking attendant is missing information on whether the victim worked for a restaurant, bank or other business (L-2).

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For a change, positive news about health care

Hackensack crews appear to be waiting for warmer weather before patching these potholes on Prospect Avenue, near The Blair House, above, and at Prospect and Euclid avenues, below.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

A 27-year-old graduate student is buying health insurance for a low $82 a month. A 29-year-old Clifton woman is paying even less, only $63 a month.

Who knew policies under the federal Affordable Care Act were so, well, affordable?

Certainly not readers of The Record, which has been dumping on President Obama's health-care reform and winking at Governor Christie's many attempts to sabotage its roll-out on HealthCare.gov, the federal Web site.

Today's lead Page 1 story on young people signing up to silence their nagging mothers is possibly the first really positive account from Staff Writer, Lindy Washburn (A-1).

Overselling

Another example of a headline that doesn't deliver is today's front-page photo overline: "VIDEO CAPTURES THRILLING FIRE RESCUE."

The photo under the heading is far from thrilling in the absence of actually viewing the video, and how many readers are going to run to their computers to do that?

Today's front page also carries a terrific story on the Port Authority's antiquated, dysfunctional shipping terminals at Port Newark/Elizabeth (A-1 and A-6).

But I'm wondering if the editors didn't overlook how thefts influence the price of the food, clothing and electronics we buy as much as what the story calls "the fragility of the port."

In the 1970s and 1980s, numerous containers disappeared from the port on a daily basis. Is that still the case? The story doesn't say.

Not possible

An editorial backing the elimination of toll collectors on the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway claims automation would "speed up commutes" (A-20).

But the real congestion isn't at the tollbooths. There are simply too many cars and too little mass transit in the New York-New Jersey region, explaining why an accident today stretched waits at the Lincoln Tunnel to 90 minutes.

Crime against readers

Deputy Assignment Editor Dan Sforza's reputation for laziness is enforced by today's Local section, every page of which is filled with police and court news, and news about the police.

Another photo heading that doesn't deliver is on L-3: "FIRE ENGULFS CLIFFSIDE PARK RESIDENCE."

Why not take a photo in the evening and use this overline: "THE SUN SET AS USUAL."

The L-3 photo shows smoke, but no flames. The caption has even less information. 

This is just filler employed by a desperate local editor who has failed repeatedly to produce a news-filled section since his boss went on medical leave.

Just a big act

The Better Living cover today shows there is a limit to a star actor's credibility.

Russel Crowe as Noah? Give me a break (BL-8).

With all of the problems we have today, including newspapers that are in the pockets of business and certain politicians, Hollywood's obsession with historical dramas is irresponsible.

But I'll be sure to catch "A Birder's Guide to Everything," which sounds like just what we need to take our minds off how Christie has destroyed New Jersey for his own political ends (BL-8).

Most of the cast members are unknowns.

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