In N.J. race for governor, GOP ads using the same kind of lies that elected Trump

Jimmy Margulies, former editorial cartoonist at The Record of Woodland Park, on the standard excuse after a mass shooting like the one that killed 58 and wounded nearly 500 in Las Vegas on Sunday night -- "Now's not the time to discuss gun control."

In "LET THEM FLOW FREE," Cartoonist Joep Bertrams portrays President Trump's crocodile tears as bullets.

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

Governor Christie's lieutenant during the nearly 8 years of mayhem they caused in New Jersey can't afford to run for the job on the issues.

So, Lieutenant Gov. Kim Guadagno's attack ads are employing the same type of lies Republicans have used for decades, most recently in Donald J. Trump's campaign for president.

The Nov. 7 gubernatorial election is a little over a month away, and Democrat Phil Murphy is leading in the polls.

Let's hope Democratic voters, confident that he will win, don't stay home in droves, as they did nationwide when Hillary Clinton was called the clear winner before the Nov. 8 election.

2013 election

Christie was elected to a second term in 2013 in the lowest turnout for a gubernatorial election in state history. 

Thousands of Democrats sat out the election.

In 2010, his first year in office, Christie eliminated state funding for family planning. And he's vetoed higher taxes on the wealthy and a $15-an-hour minimum wage.

To tame the Democratic majority in the state Legislature, the GOP bully also used nearly 600 vetoes to kill a wide range of other bills they approved, including tighter gun control.

He was elected in 2009 on his promise to lower property taxes, but the 2% cap he pushed through only slowed the increases, and New Jerseyans still pay the highest levies in the nation.

2017 campaign

In a Monmouth University poll released on Tuesday, Murphy was ahead by 14 points.

Property taxes are the top issue for New Jersey voters, and Guadagno has staked her campaign on a promise to lower tax bills, if elected governor, just as Christie did.

But governors have little control over local property taxes, which are set by municipal and school officials and assessors in each of the state's 565 home-rule communities.

And they are even higher in places like Hackensack and Englewood, where large tax-exempt hospitals shift the burden to home and business owners.

"A whopping 85 percent of voters said they haven't heard of a property tax plan from either candidate, according to the poll," Observer.com reported.

"And 70 percent said if they did see a proposal to lower property taxes, they would dismiss it as a campaign ploy."

Attack ads

"The 15- to 30-second spots touch on familiar talking points," Observer.com said of the ads both sides are running: 

"Democrats portray Lt. Kim Guadagno ... as an alter ego of Gov. Chris Christie, the least popular governor in the country.

"Republicans paint Democrat Phil Murphy as an out-of-touch millionaire [and liberal] bent on raising taxes."

In a TV pitch to middle-class homeowners, Guadagno falsely claims Murphy "already said he will raise your taxes," including "higher sales taxes."

But Murphy's $1.3 billion tax plan targets only millionaires, corporations and pot smokers, if he is successful in legalizing marijuana.

"Murphy's tax plan does not include an increase to the sales tax," Observer.com reported.

'Same old playbook'

The Murphy campaign's first and only ad so far links Guadagno to Christie, and his administration's school funding cuts and corporate tax breaks.

"The Christie playbook failed New Jersey," Murphy says in the ad. "Now Kim Guadagno wants another try."

The Record, my local daily newspaper, reported the Monmouth University poll on Wednesday.

On Monday's front page, Staff Writer Dustin Racioppi reported the candidates' positions on luring Amazon's second headquarters to New Jersey.

But Racioppi, as he has been doing for weeks, quoted liberally from an attack ad, but didn't bother asking for a response from the Democrat's campaign.

The ad said Murphy's call for a $15 hourly wage shows he is "really loaded, really liberal and really doesn't get New Jersey."

Las Vegas

To hammer home how the print edition of The Record plays second fiddle to NorthJersey.com, I couldn't find a word about Sunday night's Las Vegas massacre in the paper delivered to my home on Monday.

Instead, the front page was dominated by hysterical residents of wealthy Saddle River complaining about coyotes.

"Daily, I am terrorized by these animals," one woman claimed.

Then, after a solid day of massacre coverage on TV and radio, The Record devoted all of Tuesday's front page to the story.

How to fill space

On Page 1 last Friday, Columnist Mike Kelly wrote a tribute to a woman who was killed trying to catch a train in NJ Transit's Hoboken Terminal a year earlier, leaving behind her husband and 18-month-old daughter.

Of course, the death of Fabiola Bittar de Kroon deserved recognition, but Kelly struggled mightily to fill the columns he usually devotes to his subjects, and yet this seemingly endless piece had big holes in it.

He traced her last steps after she dropped her daughter Julia at a preschool. 

"Witnesses say De Kroon kissed Julia as she always did when she bid goodbye to her daughter," Kelly wrote.

Later, he noted a few Hoboken residents "still talk about Fabiola de Kroon, saying they continue to feel a personal and professional kinship with her."

Sociology lesson

He goes on to give a sociology lesson, reporting "more than half of Hoboken's 53,000 residents are in their early 30s," and "like De Kroon, almost 55 percent juggle professional careers and the challenges of starting and raising a family, according to Census figures."

Kelly also interviewed a worker in the coffee shop the victim frequented, the mayor of Hoboken, a pastor, the police chief and a commuter.

But I couldn't find any quotes from the dead woman's husband, Daan de Kroon, nor whether he has filed a wrongful death suit against NJ Transit, alleging the railroad's negligence caused the train crash that killed the innocent bystander.

A jury can award tens of millions of dollars in damages based on her age and her potential earning power, as well as for the loss of companionship suffered by her husband and daughter. 

Food coverage

In the absence of a weekly restaurant review, The Record's food coverage goes from bad to worse.

Today's Better Living cover declares:

"CELERY IS THE NEW

'IT' VEGETABLE"

On Wednesday, Food Editor Esther Davidowitz listed fall dishes on the menus of nine North Jersey restaurants in what sounded more like advertising than food reporting.

Last Sunday, Better Living listed 29 places in New Jersey to pick your own pumpkin.

And in last Friday's Better Living tab, the "EATS ON THE CHEAP" feature recommended the mystery meat and other dishes served at 11 casual places.

The same restaurants appear often in Better Living, including Kimchi Smoke, Bobby's Burger Palace, Mighty Quinn's Barbeque and Juicy Platters.

In a listing of halal restaurants a couple of weeks ago, Davidowitz deferred to a Paramus resident with a YouTube series, but the piece omitted Aleppo, the best Syrian restaurant in Paterson's South Paterson neighborhood.

Muslims can cook

Davidowitz visited five halal restaurants recommended by Sameer S. Sarmast, a Muslim of Indian descent who lives in Paramus.

And she notes New Jersey has the second largest Muslim population in the United States after Michigan.

"A lot of them, as I hope you and I will learn over the years, can really cook," she says.

Gannett editors ban African-American achievement from The Record's front page

Actress Melissa McCarthy made a surprise appearance on "Saturday Night Live" to deliver a hilarious send-up of White House press secretary Sean Spicer losing it time and again, above and below.

Here, McCarthy as Spicer uses a lectern to assault a reporter at the press briefing.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Before Gannett Co. bought The Record last July, African-American readers could expect Page 1 coverage of their achievements every February.

But five days into Black History Month, I haven't seen any mention of the annual observance on the front page or any page of the Woodland Park daily.

Instead, today's Sunday edition squanders precious Page 1 space on "sexting" and a column on one of the coaches in the Super Toilet Bowl.

With Gannett, as with former Publisher Stephen A. Borg in any month but February, one of the few ways blacks get on the front page is to be elected president, kill someone or commit some other horrible crime.

Court stops Trump

A federal appeals court early today denied a Trump administration request to immediately restore the travel and refugee ban after a Seattle judge blocked it (1A).

The State Department said it was restoring tens of thousands of canceled visas for travelers from seven predominantly Muslim countries, while the Department of Homeland Security "suspended" all actions for enforcing the ban, a front page story reports.

The Record's story refers to people who were affected by the ban as "foreigners" (1A).

Dictator Trump's many executive orders in his first two weeks have been greeted with horror, but they were also lampooned on "Saturday Night Live," "Real Time with Bill Maher" and other programs.

Maher said he believes Trump is "mentally ill," and that only the "sane Republicans" who control Congress can save the country.

On Jan. 27, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Jews were stunned when Trump neglected to mention 6 million of their ancestors were slaughtered.

In the opening sketch on "Saturday Night Live," a cast member played White House senior counselor Stephen K. Bannon as the Grim Reaper, who is called "president." Actor Alex Baldwin, right, did his usual send-up of President Trump.

Terrorism debate

See Columnist Mike Kelly on the Opinion front today for a tedious discussion of the debate over whether Trump's travel ban was effective in keeping terrorists out of the country or unfair to refugees and other immigrants (1O).

The opening paragraphs scream "me, me, me" as the veteran reporter hits readers over the head with his credentials -- he researched a book on terrorism and studied "suicide bombing."

Isn't that impressive?

Food coverage

Food Editor Esther Davidowitz doesn't spend much time discussing heart disease, obesity and healthy food.

So, you might want to read a seven-paragraph story on 3L in Local today about Ridgewood firefighters who are shopping and cooking healthy with a grim statistic in mind:

Cardiovascular disease is cited in 45 percent of on-duty deaths of firefighters and, as one said, "diet can help that."

More typical was the Better Living cover story on Friday.

In place of a weekly restaurant review, editors ran a story on the Dumont Crystal diner, and a dish called "Dumont Police Sandwich" (Friday's 1BL and 10BL).

The ingredients are described as "hot roast beef, brown gravy, sauteed mushrooms, onions and fresh mozzarella," but the story doesn't warn readers all of that saturated fat from the cheese and the mystery meat is really bad for your heart.