Why didn't most Democrats bother to vote on Nov. 2? They're apathetic, lazy, stupid or offer your own explanation or excuse

EASIEST WAY TO VOTE: The postage-paid, mail-in election ballot is by far the easiest way to vote, and if you don't want to take it to a drop box, like this one in Hackensack, you can leave it or give it to your mail carrier.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

HACKENSACK, N.J. -- Scores of apathetic or lazy Democrats didn't vote on Nov. 2, and the next day the news media reported the contest between Gov. Phil Murphy and his Republican opponent was "too close to call."

Murphy eventually prevailed by 73,814 votes over Republican Jack Ciattarelli, a former state assemblyman who is an ally of Donald J. Trump, according to updated results published by The New York Times on Nov. 10.

Murphy was the first Democratic governor reelected in New Jersey in 44 years, The Times said, and "his aggressive approach to controlling the [Covid-19] pandemic became a focal point of the bid to unseat him."

Voter affiliation

As of Oct. 1, there were 2,577,698 registered Democrats, who far outnumbered the 1,505,265 registered Republicans in New Jersey, according to state officials.

The election should have been a slam dunk for Murphy, even though governors in New Jersey aren't  elected in the same year as the presidential election.

Murphy received a total of 1,304,954 votes with more than 95 percent of voting precincts reporting -- or about half of the registered Democrats.

Ciattarelli got 1,231,140 votes of the 1,505,265 Republicans registered -- a much bigger turnout by the challenger's party than by Murphy's party.

Registered voters unaffiliated with a party totaled 2,396,910.

What happened?

So, why didn't Democrats step up and give Murphy another 4-year term in a decisive fashion?

Was the governor's Covid-19 mandates really to blame or were Democrats once again beset by apathy, stupidity or downright laziness?

Ciattarelli's TV commercials during the campaign claimed local property taxes had "skyrocketed" in New Jersey, but didn't explain what the governor could do to cut them.

One of the biggest components of the property tax bill  in Hackensack supports local public schools, so was Ciatterelli saying he would slash state aid to local schools, if he were elected, to lower property taxes?

Where was the media?

I never heard any reporter ask that question to the Republican candidate for governor.

If, in fact, local property taxes rose -- "skyrocketed" is more of an allegation than fact -- that was due to the superheated housing market during the pandemic, when "home prices nationwide have risen by an astonishing 24.8 percent since March 2020," The Times reports.

 

COPPING OUT: There are more than 265,000 registered Democrats in Bergen County, compared to 150,811 registered Republicans. But Governor Murphy received only 140,654 votes in the county on Nov. 2, according to this graphic from The New York Times, which updated the numbers on Nov. 10. Murphy was reelected, but his winning margin in Bergen County was only 14,230 votes.

2020 ends with my first dose of vaccine, potential end to our national nightmare

As a volunteer at Englewood Health, formerly known as Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, I was offered a first dose of Moderna's Covid-19 vaccine to prevent the coronavirus disease, which has killed more than 340,000 Americans this year. 

After I entered the hospital on Wednesday, I was asked to put on a mask over the mask I was wearing and to sanitize my hands. Other visitors were subjected to temperature checks, and the hospital cafeteria was closed to outsiders, including me. 

We ate healthy and stayed healthy, explored the great outdoors

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

HACKENSACK, N.J. -- "Lines." 

That is my answer to the headline on the front of The New York Times for Kids section last Sunday:

"If I had to describe my 2020 in one word, it would be _____."

When the quarantine began in March, nine long months ago, I stopped going to the gym and no longer was able to visit patients as a volunteer at Englewood Hospital and Medical Center, now known as Englewood Health.

That meant that as an older American, food shopping was my only means of exercise, and on my trips to Costco Wholesale, Whole Foods Market, ShopRite and H Mart, I encountered long lines of masked shopper shifting from foot to foot as they waited to get in.

Monotony

The second word I'd use to describe 2020 is "monotony." 

I pretty much get up every day before 6 a.m.

First, I make coffee, then after showering, I eat a big breakfast of leftovers or prepare an egg white omelet for other family members.

I also go food shopping early during senior hours, take a midday nap, eat or prepare dinner as early as 3 p.m., settle down in front of the TV around 4 or go for a short drive to a nearby town, then go to bed around 10:30 p.m., and get up during the night 2 or 3 times to go to the bathroom.

We spend a lot more money on food than most families of 4 because I am a pescatarian who hasn't eaten beef, pork, lamb or poultry for a decade, and my wife, son and mother-in-law are dedicated meat eaters.

This year also has seen us buying as much organic, pesticide-free food and produce as possible; only wild-caught seafood; and making sure they only eat meat and poultry raised without harmful pesticides and growth hormones.

And as an older American and amateur cook, I also have had to watch out when using recipes from The Times and other sources that are filled with artery clogging butter and cream, excessive sodium and sugar.

Beside covid in 2020, another health concern that was exposed by Consumer Reports magazine is the real danger of microplastics in our air, and our food and water supplies.

That prompted me to replace all of our plastic food-storage containers with glass, and brew our morning coffee in a stainless-steel percolator my mother used more than 30 years ago.

The water never comes in contact with plastic because the Farberware percolator has no plastic parts, unlike the cheap Mr. Coffee machines I used for years.

2021 and beyond

Amid the surge of new coronavirus cases after Thanksgiving and Christmas, I got a lift when I received an email from the hospital, inviting me and other volunteers as "members of our health-care team" to get a first dose of the Moderna Covid-19 vaccine, and I already have an appointment for the second and final dose.

That means the volunteer program at the Englewood hospital may resume, possibly as early as March, and I can once again visit patients to comfort them and offer words of encouragement after their open-heart surgeries (I got a new heart valve in September 2011).

I'd like to see my wife, son and mother-in-law get the Covid vaccine, too.

The Jan. 20 inauguration of Joe Biden as president and Kamala Harris as vice president also is something to look forward to, and I hope they can speed up the vaccination program nationwide, and end our national nightmare.

Read: Pandemic sees resurgence of family meals

Read: Bored to tears, fearing long food lines

Read: Cartoonists slam Trump's many failures

Read: What about a sudden loss of intimacy?

Panic buying in the early months of the coronavirus pandemic resulted in long lines of older American like me during the senior hour at the Costco Wholesale warehouse in Teterboro, above. Despite signs urging social distancing, below, shoppers with carts had a hard time keeping away from each other.

After I shopped during the senior hour at Whole Foods Market in Paramus, I stopped on the way to my car to take this photo of millenials and other younger shoppers who had lined up to get into the organic and natural foods supermarket.

For our Sunday fresh fish dinner, I often waited on line at the H Mart in Ridgefield, above, until the Korean chain opened a new supermarket in Little Ferry on Dec. 23, 2020, nearly 18 months after the old Little Ferry H Mart closed.

We started off our Christmas dinner with a cooked seafood salad of Alaskan King Crab, Canadian Lobster Tails and Argentinian Red Shrimp dressed with fresh lemon juice, Dijon Mustard and ground cumin.

One of the rare high points of 2020 was the availability of previously frozen wild Sockeye Salmon fillets at Costco Wholesale after the fresh wild salmon season ended in early October. I grilled these portions on the stovetop for 8 minutes and dressed them with a saute of fresh tomatoes and sliced garlic.

 

On Saturday afternoons, we usually order takeout from nearby restaurants, including Seafood Gourmet in Maywood, above; Lotus Cafe in Hackensack for great Chinese-style seafood and vegetables; and Kinyobi in Hackensack or BCD Tofu in Fort Lee for delicious Korean specialties. We also enjoyed takeout from the U Pie & Lobster Co. in Englewood and Greenhouse Juices & Cafe in Teaneck.

During the spring and summer, we made day trips to Brendan T. Byrne State Forest, above, and Wave Hill Public Garden and Cultural Center in the Bronx, below.

Using a list I copied from The New York Times many years ago, we also visited public sculptures and monuments in Manhattan, including this tribute to Duke Ellington, the legendary jazz band leader, in Harlem.

Closer to home, I was wowed by this dramatic sunrise over Hackensack as I drove down Euclid Avenue on the way to Home Depot to pick up a large recycling bin I had ordered online.

We were walloped with a big snowstorm on Dec. 17, 2020. I grimaced when I was watching TV and heard one of the anchors of the CBS Morning News introduce a report from Suffern, N.Y., and call the town "Sufferin', N.Y."

Trump-speak for lies -- alternative facts, truthful hyperbole --flummoxes media

From cartoonist Adam Zyglis of The Buffalo News.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

One look at the huge Pompton Lakes story on Page 1 today clearly shows the editors of The Record are fiddling while Washington, D.C., burns.

Completion of Phase 1 of a lake cleanup isn't news outside the small Passaic County community -- especially in view of all of the lies the Trump administration has been peddling since the inauguration on Friday.

Even more troubling is President Trump's attempt to dismantle the Obama administration's clean-energy and clean-water initiatives.

The editorial board in Woodland Park hasn't commented on the lies or the assault on the environment.

But today, OP-Ed Columnist David Leonhardt of The New York Times wrote:

"The Trump administration -- and the president himself -- have shown a shocking disregard for the truth in their first days on the job.

"This disregard puts the media in a tricky spot, because calling out the president of the United States and his staff for untruths will inevitably upset his supporters.

"But the media cannot waver. We cannot use euphemisms for 'false' and 'untrue' when those are the accurate terms."

'Alternative facts'

Trump White House adviser and former campaign manager Kellyanne Conway likely told more lies than the candidate himself, if you can imagine that.

Now, she is labeling the shocking disregard for the truth shown by Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, as "alternative facts."

They go perfectly with the president's own "truthful hyperbole," including the dark vision in his inaugural speech of "American carnage."

The environment

Trump's "America First Energy Plan" includes reviving the coal industry, which would ensure we'd have to deal with elevated levels of mercury in fish for years to come.

Coal generating plants contaminate water sources with methylmercury, which is absorbed into the body of fish.

Click here for commentary from the Gas2 blog, "America First Energy Plan Puts Americans Last."

Class v. crass

In a Sunday opinion column, editorial writer Bruce Lowry "looks back once more at the class act that was the Obama presidency" (Sunday's 2O).

Lowry doesn't contrast Obama with the crass Trump (stupid, coarse, gross, etc.); his former supermodel wife's nude photos; or the rest of the family, including children from two other wives.

But he does recall Trump's so-called birther lie that Obama was not actually a U.S. citizen, and shouldn't be able to hold the office of president.

Lowry says Trump's charge carried "racial overtones."

Humiliated by our first black president in 2011, Trump has finally gotten his revenge

Michael D'Antonio, author of "The Truth About Trump," told FRONTLINE journalists, "Donald Trump's fantasy is to be the guy who takes the key to the Oval Office from Barack Obama's hand in 2017. This is a burning personal need that he has, to redeem himself from being humiliated by the first black president."

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Friday, Jan. 20, 2017 -- when racist Donald J. Trump was sworn in as the 45th president of the United States -- is a date that will live in infamy.

In a Jan. 3 documentary on PBS that has been largely ignored by the news media, FRONTLINE traced Trump's burning desire to be elected president to the April 2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner.

"Trump's invitation to the exclusive gathering came after weeks of attacking President Barack Obama on television" for allegedly not being born in the United States, and possibly being a Muslim.

"You're not allowed to be president if you're not born in this country," Trump said during one appearance. "But there's something on that birth [certificate] -- maybe religion, maybe it says he's a Muslim ...."

'Treated like a pinata'

"But that night, in front of Washington's journalists, politicians and power brokers, Obama would hit back," FRONTLINE reported.

Obama, who had provided his birth certificate, showing he was born in Hawaii, said:

"No one is happier, no one is prouder to put this birth certificate matter to rest than the Donald. [laughter] And that's because he can finally get back to focusing on the issues that matter -- like, did we fake the moon landing? [laughter]

"What really happened in Roswell? [laughter] and where are Biggie and Tupac? [laughter]

"All kidding aside, obviously, we all know about your credentials and breadth of experience," the president continued, before relating how Trump had fired someone on the "Celebrity Apprentice" TV show.

"And these are the kind of decisions that would keep me up at night," the president said to more laughter and applause.

"And he's being treated like a pinata by the president of the United States, and I think he felt humiliated," said Timothy O'Brien, author of "TrumpNation."

"Donald dreads humiliation and he dreads shame," said Michael D'Antonio, author of "The Truth About Tump."

"And this is why he often attempts to humiliate and shame other people. So in the case of the president ridiculing him, I think this was intolerable for Donald Trump."

At the 2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner, one attendee recalled, President Obama took the microphone and declared, "Donald Trump is here tonight!" before he "proceeds to filet Donald publicly."

"Trump was steaming," one participant noted. "His face was all locked in. He was not having a good time."

'Maybe I'll show them all'

"I think that is the night that he resolves to run for president," Trump political adviser Roger Stone told FRONTLINE.

"'Maybe I'll just run. Maybe I'll show them all.'"

Omarosa Manigault of the Trump '16 Campaign said:

"Every critic, every detractor will have to bow down to President Trump. It's everyone who's ever doubted Donald, whoever disagreed, whoever challenged him. It's the ultimate revenge to become the most powerful man in the universe."

Grew up in Queens

FRONTLINE begins a discussion of Trump's formative years in Queens, where he grew up "in a posh suburb of Jamaica Estates," in a huge house with columns called "Tara" that was designed by his father, Fred Trump, a real estate developer.

Donald and his brothers and sisters, including Maryanne, now a federal appeals court judge, were raised in luxury.

"When it rained and he had to deliver his papers," author D'Antonio recalled, "the chauffeur would take him around."

Donald Trump was mischievous, though, and when he was 13 years old, his father sent him to the toughest boarding school he could find, the New York Military Academy.

"The New York Military Academy was no-nonsense, heavy on discipline, over the years home to the children of gangster John Gotti and Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista," the narrator says.

"He was a star athlete," the narrator says of Trump. "But his classmates agree he was proudest of winning the ultimate accolade in the all-boys school:

"He was named 'Ladies' Man' in the school yearbook.

"Hugh Hefner, the publisher of Playboy magazine, was a role model for many of the boys."

Enriched himself

After a spectacular series of businesses successes and failures, Trump began selling shares in his struggling Atlantic City casinos.

"Trump paid himself $44 million for services, and he'd been reimbursed millions in expenses even as the stock price began to fall," the narrator said.

"The company filed for bankruptcy three times. Investors lost billions."

You can see a full transcript or view FRONTLINE's "President Trump" here.