Road Warrior errors? Editors try to kill the messenger

Rush hour on Summit Avenue in Hackensack. In more than a decade of writing the Road Warrior column, which is supposed to focus on commuting issues, Staff Writer John Cichowski has largely ignored North Jersey's worsening traffic congestion and the lack of mass-transit alternatives.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

You may have missed a comment I published on Saturday from the editor of the Facebook page for Road Warrior Bloopers.

The retired engineer set up the page after The Record's editors started attacking him for exposing chronic errors in the so-called commuting column.

The column has been written for more than 11 years by reporter John Cichowski, whose thrice-weekly appearances in the Woodland Park daily have been cut back.

The Record has never explained the reason for the cutback, likely because readers are held in contempt by the arrogant editors, including Martin Gottlieb, Deirdre Sykes and Dan Sforza.

Here is the comment in full:

"The Road Warrior Bloopers Facebook page provides corrected facts, along with supporting sources and Internet links, all of which are beneficial to the safety and knowledge of readers, in response to mistake-ridden Road Warrior columns, which continually present unsafe, illegal, contradictory, and totally misreported information and advice.

"Readers should appreciate these needed corrections.

"All of this corrected information is always first presented to the Road Warrior and his editors, who continually ignore making any corrections.

"In fact, the very early communications and occasional follow-up efforts have been made in a very constructive objective manner to try to work with the Road Warrior and his editors to try and prevent his mistakes or correct them subsequent to publications. Unfortunately, not only did the Road Warrior and his editors refuse to accept these conciliatory offers, but they went out of their way to make denigrating comments in regards to these offers.

"Therefore, the gloves have come off and readers are shown how unprofessional and incompetent the Road Warrior really is based on the corrected facts, which are also supported by referenced sources, which are frequently the exact same source cited by the Road Warrior in his columns, and Internet links.

"Readers need to made aware of the very misleading, and many times false presentations in the Road Warrior columns if they want to stay on the right side of the law for themselves and their children who drive, avoid dangerous situations promoted by the Road Warrior to themselves and their young drivers, and not be misled or afraid of grossly exaggerated or false information about road and mass transit transportation.

"Readers need to made aware of just how bad the Road Warrior reporting really is when he frequently contradicts himself in the very same column, or reports mistaken information that contradicts what he correctly reported in previous columns.

"Readers need to be shown that the Road Warrior's responses in many of his columns to readers, who question the accuracy of what he reported in a previous column, are either very denigrating to the person questioning his reporting, or very misleading or false based on the actual facts.

"Readers need to be shocked and angered by the very misleading, and many times false reports and advice in the Road Warrior columns.

"The Road Warrior Bloopers Facebook page never crosses the line in offering information or opinions that are not supported by the facts and referenced sources."

Here is a link: Road Warrior Bloopers at The Record

Christie's future

In the unlikely event Chris Christie is elected president in 2016, he couldn't possibly treat New Jerseyans any worse than he has since he became governor in 2010 (A-1).

Given that he won't be making a decision until next year, why is this speculative story leading the paper today?

And is the so-called ANALYSIS really advancing other stories from reporter-cum-lap dog Melissa Hayes that appeared after last week's election, celebrating how well Christie did in raising money and campaigning for Republican candidates across the country?

The overweight GOP bully continues to be the butt of jokes, but he says he would be fit enough to campaign for the Republican nomination and the White House.

Still, he has done such an awful job for the New Jersey economy, the environment and the state's fiscal health, and there are lingering questions about his involvement in the George Washington Bridge scandal.

In another front-page story today, Christie isn't a member of a new gun control group that plans to take its case to manufacturers -- but you won't know that unless you manage to read deep into the continuation page (A-1 and A-10).

Trains, not planes

The Record's stories on trains carrying "highly explosive Canadian crude oil each week through Bergen County towns," including Teaneck, focuses on a relatively new quality of life issue (L-1).

For decades, the editors have ignored aircraft noise that affects far more North Jersey residents, including those in Hackensack, where private jets seem to skim the rooftops of high-rises and hospital buildings on the way to Teterboro Airport. 

The editors also do P.R. for a continuing menace --overweight white men riding Harley-Davidson motorcycles that are modified to be as noisy as possible when they roar down our quiet streets.

They are only shown in photos when they organize a charity run.

Hackensack news

You'll find big Hackensack news on L-3 today -- a woman having her eyes tested, and a man whose hand was injured by an NJ Transit train.

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Ebola is getting bigger play than the upcoming election

On Friday night, the streets around Clinton Place in Hackensack were packed with cars and costumed children making their trick-or-treat rounds as police directed traffic and watched over pedestrians. Bad weather cancelled Halloween festivities in 2012 and 2013.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Despite all of the front-page headlines, New Jersey still hasn't had a single confirmed case of Ebola.

Yet, Governor Christie and other politicians continue to run off at the mouth, and The Record continues to cover the epidemic that isn't.

Here comes Charles Stile to bore readers with another political column on the Ebola response of the GOP bully and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (A-1).

Another columnist, Mike Kelly, pushes hundreds of other words around on the Obama administration's response to Ebola, but loses readers almost immediately by flashing a shit-eating grin in his thumbnail photo (O-1).

Any journalist who allows his editors to use a dated photo that makes him look like a fool can't be taken seriously.

These Halloween scenes on Clinton Place were photographed on Thursday afternoon, above and below.

What about the election?

The editors haven't been paying as much attention to Election Day on Tuesday, when residents of the 5th Congressional District, which includes Bergen County, can get rid of Rep. Scott Garrett, R-Wantage, a Tea Party idol who is against just about everything (L-3).

An e-mail from challenger Roy Cho, an attorney in Hackensack, notes:

Daylight Savings Time Begins Today!

Make Sure You Set Your Clock Back One Hour

Election Day is Tuesday!

Make Sure You Don't Let Scott Garrett Set the Country Back

 

Since Elected in 2002, Garrett Voted Against:

 

Reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act

Equal Pay for Women

 Reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act of 1965

Protecting the Medicare and Social Secuity Guarantee

Reauthorization of the Endangered Species Act of 1973

Raising the Minimum Wage

Ending Don't Ask, Don't Tell

and a whole lot more...

Cho has been endorsed by The Record, The Star-Ledger, the New Jersey Jewish Standard and other newspapers, but Garrett hasn't received any editorial support in his bid for a seventh term.

Losing facts in the dark

Today, Road Warrior John Cichowski reports on dark street lights and highway lights, suggesting they are the reason he has completely lost sight of accuracy (L-1).

In his column last Sunday, Cichowski discussed reports of "teen violence" when he meant to say "violence against teens" tied those red decals on the license plates of young drivers, according to the Facebook page for Road Warrior Bloopers.

The page pits a fact-loving retired engineer against an addled columnist who has failed miserably to focus on issues important to commuters:

"In his Sunday column [Oct. 26], the Road Warrior continues to repeat mistaken and meaningless information and deadly, unsafe, and illegal advice for parents and teenagers about New Jersey's Graduated Driving License (GDL) laws and its impact on young drivers.

"Road Warrior indicated that GDL safety restrictions bar teenage drivers from loading cars with more than one teen passenger only if another experienced driver is present.

"The GDL law only allows for more than one passenger (teenage or otherwise), who are not dependents, only if a parent or guardian is present.

"He stupidly indicated that New Jersey has not documented any reports of 'teen violence' related to the GDL red decals on their cars.

"He should have stated there were no documented reports of violence against teenagers rather than teen violence, which means violent acts committed by teenagers."

See: Confusing teen drivers and parents

Why no one votes

A page and a half of Local is filled with the names of candidates in municipal, county and school board races, but for the vast majority, the paper hasn't reported what issues are at stake or what they stand for (L-6 and L-7).

Christie coverage

Staff Writer Melissa Hayes, who is traveling with Governor Christie's entourage, continues to report on his out-of-state fundraising in the same, breathless tones you'd find in a press release from the Republican Governors Association (Page 1 on Saturday).

Hayes quotes so-called experts as she tries to nail down whether Christie, who heads the group, is going to seek the GOP nomination for president in 2016.

What about the perspective of environmentalists, mass-transit advocates, women and Democrats in the state Legislature who have been stiffed big time since Christie took office in 2010?

What about voters in northern New Jersey? Do The Record's editors ever think to ask them who they want as their next president?

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Christie's frequent hand jobs are the only 'job' he is doing

A smaller number of homes on Clinton Place in Hackensack have been decorated for Halloween than in past years. Does the addition of a lawn sign suggest that this candidate's campaign is dead or that he wants the dead to vote for him?

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Record keeps on quoting Governor Christie as saying he is doing his job, but his constituents are baffled by the claim.

On Wednesday, Christie bullied a former Asbury Park councilman who protested the glacial pace of Sandy recovery two years after the superstorm hit New Jersey.

On Thursday, the GOP bully said, "It's just another day at the ranch, the Rancho Christie, and so we'll keep doing our jobs" (A-3).

"Rancho Christie"? Is that the governor's way of trying to appeal to Hispanics in his quixotic bid for the White House?

Sloppy reporting

The Record's story on Thursday didn't mention that protester Jim Keady is a former councilman and part of a Sandy victims advocacy group called Finish the Job.

Nor did Staff Writer Melissa Hayes report how angry and unpresidential Christie was when Keady stood up and kept talking over the politician, as you could clearly see if you watched TV news on Thursday.

The Record's Christie-friendly filter is evident again today in an editorial noting that only half of the 8,800 homeowners approved for relief money have received it (A-20).

The editorial doesn't even come close to saying Christie bears some of the responsibility.

One of the trainers at 24 Hour Fitness in Paramus this morning.

How is Christie doing?

Shouldn't the taxpayers dock Christie for the more than 65 days he has spent out of state this year to raise funds as head of the Republican Governors Association?

He's visited 36 states and Washington, D.C., according to what reads like one of the governor's press releases on The Record's A-3 today.

Besides hand jobs, has Christie done the job of expanding mass transit in one of the nation's most traffic-choked regions or cleaning up the environment?

Christie can't even figure out how to fix the bankrupt Transportation Trust Fund for infrastructure and mass-transit improvements.

What else has he accomplished besides vetoing numerous initiatives from the Democratic-controlled state Legislature -- from raising the minimum wage to open space preservation? 

Election coverage

For the second day in a row, The Record questions the viability of a candidate based on how much he or she has raised in contributions (L-1).

The story makes no mention of the many Democrats who voted for Kathleen Donovan, a Republican who is seeking a second term as county executive on Nov. 4.

I am among those Democrats who split their vote and chose Donovan then and again on my mail-in ballot for this election, because I am repelled by the practices of the county and local Democratic organizations.

Are polls reliable?

Another story on the election appears on L-3, a poll that purports to show that Rep. Scott Garrett, the Tea Party icon from Wantage, is leading challenger Roy Cho by a wider margin than before.

With about 70 percent of the voters living in Bergen County, only widespread voter apathy could derail Cho's momentum in the 5th Congressional District.

Recall the polls that said the race between President Obama and Republican Mitt Romney was too close to call. 

If fact, the president's resounding victory embarrassed the candidate of the 1 percent.

The rest of Local today is filled with an inordinate amount of Law & Order news.

Too sheepish

Despite the poor preparation of entrees and a dessert, Staff Writer Elisa Ung gives a rave, 3-star review to The Plum & Pear in Wyckoff (BL-1).

She again touts the "quality of the ingredients" and praises the restaurant's global focus, but doesn't say why the owner chose domestic chops over naturally raised Australian lamb in a $34 special.

And she was bowled over by three desserts, which many health conscious customers never eat.

Why didn't she report on the taste of the house-made whole wheat linguine or a popular "greens and grains" salad? 

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Are the reporters or editors the real problem?

NJ Transit's No. 165 Turnpike Express, which I boarded in Hackensack, approaching the ramp to the problem-plagued Port Authority Bus Terminal in midtown Manhattan on a wet Thursday morning. Why is The Record's chief transportation reporter writing about the rebuilding of a church today? 

One of the few improvements in recent months are touch-screen terminals to help commuters find the platform where they can catch the bus back to New Jersey. I have yet to see any mention of them in The Record.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

In today's disappointing Sunday edition, don't look for stories and columns that are relevant to your life in North Jersey.

The only local dateline on the front page is Fairview, where Staff Writer Monsy Alvarado explores the problems of a family headed by an illegal immigrant who was arrested and thrown into a cell (A-1).

Columnist Mike Kelly is so burned out he's back on the Sayreville beat, which is way out of the circulation area, rehashing old cases of football hazing (A-1).

Kelly tackles another "local story" -- Ebola -- on the Opinion front (O-1).

Dog chases bus

Like an adoring lap dog, Staff Writer Melissa Hayes again follows Governor Christie around on his travels raising money for the mean-spirited Republican Party -- totally ignoring the mess he's left behind in New Jersey (A-1).

Christie has really screwed up the region's mass-transit network, but Staff Writer Christopher Maag, the chief transportation writer, was sent to the city to write about a church destroyed on 9/11 (A-3).

You will find a column about the problem-plagued Port Authority Bus Terminal in the Opinion section, but that was written by a daily bus commuter from Rockland County, N.Y. (O-2).

An escalator takes commuters from the upper-level bus platforms to a lower floor at the Manhattan bus terminal.

More road kill

On the Local front, addled Road Warrior John Cichowski is writing about yet another delayed road-construction project, this one in Passaic County, that affects only a small fraction of the readership.

This isn't news, and doesn't help commuters one bit.

Hackenack news

The most readable story in the paper today is also on L-1, where Kazmier Wysocki, 95, a three-time Hackensack mayor, is shown with his wife, son and grandson at his city manufacturing company.

It's refreshing to read about Hackensack history that doesn't involve the Zisa family, which ran the city for decades and stuck the county seat with the derogatory name of "Zisaville."

Staff vacation?

None of the stories in today's 8-page Business section appears to have been written by a staffer in the Woodland Park newsroom (B-1).

The cover story on "crowdfunding," which discusses North Jersey business people, carries the byline of Virginia M. Citrano, a freelancer.

The rest of the section was supplied by news services or The Wall Street Journal.

Ignoring local stores

The Better Living cover today is about the cheese department at Zabar's on the Upper West Side of Manhattan -- not about any of the great cheese departments in North Jersey (BL-1).

Ditzy Food Editor Esther Davidowitz profiles the Leonia woman who runs the department, and in the process, ignores tens of thousands of readers who are watching their weight and cholesterol.

How predictable. The head of Zabar's cheese department, Olga Dominguez, is called "a big cheese."

She is quoted as saying there are three basic types of cheeses -- hard, soft and semi-soft -- but to people watching their weight and cholesterol there are only two -- full fat and reduced fat.

Unfortunately, the sloppy six-figure production editor, Liz Houlton, missed a typo in Dominguez' name in the photo caption. 

Doesn't compute

There is an easy way to avoid the table-top computers Restaurant Reviewer Elisa Ung seems so fascinated with in her silly column today:

Don't go to Chili's and other chain restaurants to eat the crap they serve (BL-1).

More on Germany

For the third week in a row, a major wire-service story is needed to fill the thin Travel section.

This despite Travel Editor Jill Schensul telling a respected media blog, JimRomenesko.com, that the paper negotiates favorable "press rates" for trips to minimize the use of canned wire copy.

As for Schensul's column today, a large part of it is based on one of those trips, her visit to Papenburg, Germany, where she went on a Royal Caribbean tour of a shipyard building two mega cruise ships.

The gushing story about the new ships appeared as her section's cover story on Sept. 14, though its relevance to most North Jersey residents eluded me.

Today, she describes the graveyard she found in Papenburg as "a veritable botanical garden."

The respect for the dead shown by these Germans only serves to remind me of the lack of respect they showed to millions of living and dead during of the Holocaust, and wonder why Schensul even bothered to write about the cemetery.

She also omitted any mention of the Day of the Dead, which is widely observed in the North Jersey's Mexican-American communities. 

The real questions

So, we know Editor Marty Gottlieb controls every word that appears on Page 1 -- including endless speculation about Christie's White House bid -- but why are the clueless local editors assigning the transportation reporter to non-transportation stories?

Why are Assignment Editors Deirdre Sykes and Dan Sforza allowing Cichowski to write the majority of his Road Warrior columns off of complaining e-mails from readers whose only interest is seeing their names in print?

And when will Kelly stop making every new column seem old?

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Christie's own panel says he's failed on pension reform

With many businesses closed and residents off from work, the Jewish New Year effect was evident on Cedar Lane in Teaneck on Thursday afternoon, above. But some employers, including The Record, refuse to give Jewish employees paid time off for Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Record's editors couldn't bring themselves to put the story on Page 1 today, but a panel named by Governor Christie says the GOP bully has failed miserably to reform the public-employee pension system.

And the two Trenton reporters assigned to the story jumped through hoops to soft pedal the criticism from the nine-member panel (A-3).

"The report played down the impact of reforms passed in 2011, which Christie has held up as a model for other states [italics added]," Staff Writers John Reitmeyer and Melissa Hayes say.

Tax hike pushed

The lead paragraph emphasizes the "attention grabbing figures" offered by the panel:

"Every New Jersey household would have to write a $12,000 check just to close the $37 billion gap in pension funding ... and the state would need to double the amount of tax money dedicated for all benefits to 20 percent of the state budget."

To close a "$90 billion drain on future budgets," one of the options is "additional tax revenue" -- such as a surcharge on millionaires -- "something Christie states is not an option," according to the story.

Need money for roads 

Despite mounting evidence Christie's rigidly conservative no-tax policies are wrecking the state economy, The Record's editorial editor refuses to urge the governor to back an increase in the gas tax.

"You aren't going to fix New Jersey roads and bridges without money," is the introduction to an editorial on the state's broken Transportation Trust Fund (A-12).

Besides ignoring the fund also pays for mass-transit improvements, the editorial wimps out on recommending a hike in the gas tax -- apparently out of fear that would alienate the car dealers whose ad revenue has made the Borg publishing family rich.

Big wheel

Is it just a coincidence the last name of Afzal "Bobby" Khan rhymes with "con" (B-1)?

A group of people who owned Porsches, Bentleys and BMWs allege Khan sold their cars on consignment, never paid them and never transferred the titles.

Khan's luxury car dealership, Emporio Motor Group, is on Route 17 in Ramsey.

Terra firma

Today, Staff Writer Elisa Ung gives 2.5 stars to Terra, an Englewood restaurant that opened in May next to bergenPAC, replacing the Grand Cru Wine Bar.

Or, as her poorly edited sentence says, "Terra opened ... in the site of the former Grand Cru Wine Bar [italics added]."

The owners, Ung says, are Steven Sotland, previously a managing partner of Grand Cru, and his wife.

But the review doesn't say whether Stephen and Jennifer Borg still have an interest in Terra, as they once did in Grand Cru.

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Editors finally discover 'Little Mexico' under their noses

Hackensack's Salem Street, between River and Moore streets, was closed Friday, disrupting traffic. How many of the people in this photo are actually working? Three blocks of Salem, from River to State streets, have been torn up for weeks to perform underground work.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

In a single front-page story today, The Record's editors try to play catch-up on nearly three decades of Mexican migration to a city not far from their ivory tower newsroom.

Spurred by Governor Christie's visit to Mexico,  the reporter who covers immigrants for the Woodland Park daily traces the growth of Passaic city's Poblanos or people who hail from the state and city of Puebla (A-1).

The Record's local-news editors have largely ignored Passaic's Mexican-Americans until now, even though the onetime Food section wrote extensively about North Jersey's Little Mexico in 2003.

On Friday, Christie visited Puebla, citing the big percentage of Mexican immigrants in New Jersey who come from there (38.75%). 

Previously, the GOP bully slashed tax credits for Mexican-Americans and other working poor, and cut aid to Passaic and five other impoverished cities.

In her story about Passaic's Poblanos, Staff Writer Monsy Alvarado undercounts "taquerias, Mexican bakeries, restaurants and stores," and makes no mention of the wholesale Mexican food warehouses that are open to the public (A-4). 


Christie's revenge

Another rating agency has condemned Christie's fiscal policies in New Jersey, citing, among other things, a state economy that "continues to lag that of the nation" (A-1).

The A-4 story by Melissa Hayes on Christie's visit to Puebla says the governor "came to the state nearly 90 miles from Mexico City," but didn't he meet Puebla Gov. Rafael Moreno Valle in the capital city, also called Puebla?

Tips immigration hand

At one point, Christie seems to be saying the unaccompanied children crossing the Mexican border illegally should respect and recognize the laws of the United States.

Then, he is quoted gushing about "an endless line of one child more adorable than the next" -- presumably, as long as they stay in Mexico.

Friday was the last day of what Christie called a trade mission, but The Record hasn't reported whether any new deals or contracts were signed between New Jersey and Mexican businesses.

Indeed, the gushing coverage seems designed only to boost Christie's prospects as a Republican presidential contender in 2016.

Police blotter

Head Assignment Editor Deirdre Sykes and her deputy, Dan Sforza, did a great job filling today's Local section with police and court news (L-1, L-2, L-3 and L-6).

Second look

In last Sunday's Road Warrior column, confused Staff Writer John Cichowski again provided "wrong, unsafe and illegal advice" to teenagers and their parents, according to the Facebook page for Road Warrior Bloopers.

"The Road Warrior [Cichowski] reported that an official stated that about 800 teens were killed in car crashes in New Jersey over the last 10 years.

"Actually, there were only about 400 teenage deaths for drivers and passengers in the last 10 years, according to New Jersey State Police road fatality annual statistics, which the Road Warrior frequently references, but misstates."

See: Take away John Cichowski's license to write 

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Corrective Hackensack story fails to identify council critics

Today is the deadline for paying third-quarter property taxes in Hackensack. If your payment is not in before the Tax Collector's Office closes for the day, you might have to pay interest. I put my check into the City Hall lock box a few days ago, above. 

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Today, The Record publishes a second story on David R. Troast, the Hackensack City Council's choice for city manager, that fills in many of the blanks in the initial report and puts critics' "hysteria" in perspective.

But Staff Writer Todd South, who covered Tuesday night's council meeting, again fails to identify most of Troast's critics as being affiliated with the city's Board of Education and local Democratic Chairwoman Lynne Hurwitz, the power behind the Zisa family.

And he didn't tell readers two of those board members were on the council slate that was defeated in the May 2013 municipal election.

In fact, what has become clear since the Citizens for Change slate took office in July 2013 is a nasty battle among Republicans in power and Democrats who are still seething over being thrown out of office after decades of rule, cronyism and patronage.

Daniel Carola speaking to the Hackensack City Council on Tuesday night. The Record quotes him by name today (L-6), but doesn't identify his as a member of the Board of Education.

South and Troast

Today, South, who worked previously at the Times Free Press in Chattanooga, Tenn., fills in details of Troast's professional and personal background that didn't appear in his story on Wednesday.

Unfortunately, without that background critics' complaints seemed more credible.

Troast, 54, was seated in the first row of the council chambers on Tuesday night, as was South, but they apparently didn't speak then or the reporter didn't use anything he might have learned in an interview.

Today, he reports Troast, who grew up in Wyckoff, "is a longtime Hawthorne resident who worked as a planner and township manager in Sparta from 1996 to 2013."

As for a Sparta employee's lawsuit, which was mentioned Tuesday night, Troast is not named as a defendant.

No criminal charges resulted from a complaint that Troast had an antique rifle in the trunk of his car on township property about the time he resigned from his township manager position in Sparta in August 2013.

South mistakenly identifies Troast's former position as "city manager" in Sparta (L-6).

Critics cited Sparta's lack of diversity, but Troast says he has a diverse family through marriage and adoption, "with nieces and nephews of Asian, Hispanic and African-American descent."

And Troast is now working as "a confidential assistant on development projects for the city of Passaic," where thousands of Mexican-Americans live, at a part-time salary of $25,000.

Troast also holds graduate degrees in public administration and urban planning, and would be the first city manager in recent memory who didn't commute in a city owned car.

Old and depressed

Angelo Talignani of Hasbrouck Heights was 85 and could no longer drive. 

He showed signs of depression and "expressed regret that he was still alive," according to the prosecutor (A-8).

Is it so hard to understand why he might want to kill his close friend and his bedridden wife and then commit suicide?

But at The Record, a copy editor with no concept of what it means to grow old and depressed or to lose your freedom wrote a ridiculous headline over today's front-page story:

"Inexplicable tragedy"

Boost for wealthy

On Governor Christie's first full day in Mexico on Wednesday, he made clear in a speech his only interest is in helping wealthy business owners get even richer at the expense of the environment (A-1).

The GOP bully was the wrong choice for governor of New Jersey and he certainly isn't fit to run the United States.

Christie and his 16-member delegation are living high on the hog in Mexico City thanks to Choose New Jersey, a corporate-backed non-profit "that aims to bolster business relations in the state" (A-8).

But who is paying the way for Staff Writer Melissa Hayes -- one of the governor's chief boosters -- who is in Mexico for the Woodland Park daily, hanging on Christie's every word, burp and fart?

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Until now, the GOP bully has ignored or hurt N.J. Mexicans

Underground utility lines are being installed along three blocks of Salem Street in Hackensack, between River and State streets, above and below.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Record's front page today and Sunday previewed Governor Christie's trip to Mexico, but there is only a passing reference to the tens of thousands of Mexican-Americans who live in the city of Passaic.

What has the GOP bully done for the working- and middle-class Poblano families who live in Passaic besides ignoring them and cutting aid to their schools and poor city?

Passaic, with a population of 70,000, is often called another Puebla, the Mexican city and state Christie is scheduled to visit, according to the Page 1 story today on the governor's purely political trip.

With dozens of restaurants, bakeries and manufacturers, the city has been a center of Mexican culture and food for many years, as noted in a 2003 Food section cover story in The Record, "Mexican Revolution in Passaic."

Voices of Mexico

The Consulate General of Mexico in New York said more than 40% of Mexicans in the tri-state area are from Puebla, and the majority of them settled in Passaic, VoicesofNY.org reported in January.

Yet, Christie didn't even visit Passaic city during his successful reelection campaign last year.

Melissa Hayes' story today appears two days after a Charles Stile column on Christie's South of the Border visit, and there was at least one other preview of the trip.

Broken Record

Doesn't The Record have anything else to say about the worst governor in New Jersey history than to promote his presidential ambitions?

Legal fees to defend Christie and his aides in the George Washington Bridge lane-closure scandal now top $9 million, WNYC-FM reported today, with $7 million billed by the governor's legal team.

Surely, state officials will try to negotiate a smaller amount or even ask a judge if the fees are reasonable.

Why isn't The Record chasing that story?

Local news

Christie's Mexico visit was trumped this morning by the sensational murder of Karen Piotti, 63, of Ho-Ho-Kus, allegedly by her son, Nicholas, 24 (A-1).

On the Local front, a photo and caption makes light of an elderly woman who drove an Audi sedan into a pool in Wyckoff.

The photo over line is really imaginative: 

CAR IN THE POOL IN WYCKOFF

The "grandmother" and her passenger survived, but the photo only reminds readers of how The Record has ignored the challenges facing older drivers, and apparently has never reported on re-training courses that might be available to them.

You'd never know Editor Martin Gottlieb is 66 from the lack of reporting on how many seniors mistake the accelerator for the brake pedal and end up in a pool, crash into a building or hit a pedestrian, often with fatal consequences.

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Mounting errors cause John Borg to spin in his grave

One of the attractive properties available on Hackensack's sleepy Main Street, at the corner of Bridge Street, five years after the Borg publishing family abandoned the city. The Record's retail reporter, meanwhile, is probably preparing another story on big-box stores or malls.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Even the Page 1 story declaring the original owner of the Bergen Evening Record a "Bergen County Legend" contains a major error.

The Record's glib front-page headline -- "Indian chief to Mafia don" -- is part fact, part fiction (A-1).

Sure. It got me and other readers to turn the page and plow through the list selected by the county Historical Society.

But actor James Gandolfini only portrayed a "Mafia don."

The "Indian chief" is Oratam, leader of the Hackansacky Indian Tribe (A-8), but the story doesn't mention the chief's profile is prominently featured on Hackensack's official seal.

The official Hackensack seal.

John Borg

Today's story reports that John Borg, originally a stockbroker, "became the owner of the Bergen Evening Record, which 'exposed political scandal, despite kidnap and death threats,' the Historical Society said" (A-8).

Borg was the great-grandfather of Publisher Stephen A. Borg.

One has to wonder whether Stephen Borg will be remembered for cutting costs so relentlessly that he sacrificed accurate journalism.

The befuddled John Cichowski, who has written the Road Warrior column for nearly 11 years, has made more errors than the entire newsroom staff in Woodland Park, and few of them have been corrected.

Since a major downsizing ordered by Stephen Borg in 2008, Cichowski's column has rarely been edited or fact-checked -- despite Production Editor Liz Houlton, who is paid six figures to ensure just that.

Today's paper

Staff Writer Melissa Hayes has become so cozy with Governor Christie she doesn't even tell readers the age of Bridget, "his younger daughter" (A-7).

The Local staff knocked itself out getting all the details of a dramatic rescue by three state troopers who pulled a truck driver out of neck-high water in Overpeck Creek on Tuesday (L-1).

But there is not a word on how driver Lawrence Scherf, 66, crashed and burned his tractor-trailer on the New Jersey Turnpike in Ridgefield.

Was he speeding or did he fall asleep, as have so many tractor-trailer drivers recently?

I chuckled at one detail: "The troopers dropped their leather utility belts and jumped into water up to their necks" (L-3).

Utility belts? Surely, the reporter meant "gun belts."

Pardo and Rieck

The Associated Press writer who handled the obituary of announcer Don Pardo didn't think readers would be interested in how he lived to 96 (L-6).

And what moronic layout editor at The Record decided to bury Staff Writer Jay Levin's light-hearted treatment of cancer victim Jeffrey Rieck lampooning relatives in his own obituary (L-6)?

A famous Hoboken deli didn't last long in this Main Street storefront.

High rents on Main Street, low chances of success.

'No-raises recovery'

The Record's Business editors weren't about to send out reporters to interview workers on what Bloomberg News calls "the no-raises recovery" (L-7).

"Five years of economic expansion have done almost nothing to boost paychecks for typical American workers, while the rich have gotten richer."

That's certainly the case at The Record and North Jersey Media Group, owned by the wealthy Borg family.

Cory Nieves

On the Better Living front, the upbeat story about a 10-year-old CEO from Englewood leaves a couple of questions unanswered (BL-1).

If the fashion-conscious Cory Nieves has been selling hot cocoa, lemonade and cookies since 2009 to help his mom buy a car, why is she working for him and still taking the bus?

And Cory might want to rethink selling cookies, if he just looked around and saw all the kids his age struggling with obesity, a subject The Record has avoided for decades.

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