UPDATE: Reporters question Murphy's ambitious plan, veracity of Trump tell-all

Cartoonist Daryl Cagle commenting on the GOP elephant in the room, in this case a racist President Trump in the Oval Office. "You either stand with America's values of Dignity, Justice and Equality for all -- or you stand with a racist president and administration," the Democratic donkey says. "Let's do both," the elephant replies.

COLUMNIST CHALLENGES BOOK

CALLING TRUMP A MADMAN

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

Editor's note: In one of his first acts in office on Tuesday, Governor Murphy signed an executive order demanding equal pay for women in New Jersey.

By VICTOR E. SASSON

EDITOR

Democrat Phil Murphy was sworn in on Tuesday as New Jersey's 56th governor, signaling a new direction for the Garden State and ending an 8-year reign of terror by the worst chief executive in New Jersey history.

Murphy's plan -- including legalizing marijuana, creating a state bank, raising the minimum wage to $15 and offering free community college -- only seems ambitious given all the damage conservative ogre Chris Christie did to New Jersey.

When you look at how the GOP thug wrecked state finances, mass transit, the environment and health  care, among other programs, Murphy's progressive agenda may seem impossible to achieve.

But the new governor has a Democratic majority in the state Legislature on his side, and a major ally in New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who, like Murphy, has pledged to resist all of the reckless policies of President Trump.

Slanted coverage

Sadly, reporters and columnists at The Record, my local daily newspaper, have kept up a drumbeat of doubt when writing about Murphy.

A profile on Sunday's front page appeared under block letters:

"FEARLESS PHIL"

The sub-headline:

"Murphy eager to rush

into fire of politics"

Actually, during the campaign, Murphy was all about issues -- not politics -- and The Record's relentless focus on the partisan divide in Trenton and Washington doesn't bode well for readers. 

Murphy as Sisyphus

The Gannett editors running The Record can't help themselves, using more than half of Tuesday's front page to tell readers Murphy is doomed to fail.

Inexplicably, a Page 1 story on key issues Murphy will face after his inauguration uses an enormous illustration of a Sisyphus-like figure:

In Greek mythology, Sisyphus was condemned to ceaselessly roll an enormous boulder to the top of a steep hill, only to watch it come back and hit him, repeating the action for eternity.

Praise for Christie

In the story -- "CHALLENGES ALL AROUND" --reporters Dustin Racioppi and Nicholas Pugliese fall all over themselves trying to praise Christie's two terms in office:

"Despite the accomplishments of his Republican predecessor Chris Christie -- an improved economy, slowed growth of property tax bills [and] pension and health benefits reforms for public workers...."

But the reporters then contradict themselves, noting New Jersey "remains mired in costly, entrenched problems," including "a strained budget [and] a pension system in crisis."

Of course, these inept reporters never explain why state workers' pensions are "in crisis" after Christie supposedly reformed the very same system.

'Liberal direction' 

Racioppi was assigned to cover Christie, and judging from his slanted reporting during and after the 2017 gubernatorial campaign, grew to admire the GOP bully and his lieutenant governor, who lost to Murphy.

Today, in The Record's lead Page 1 story, the reporter couldn't wait to slap a "liberal" label on Murphy:

"Taking control from Chris Christie" on Tuesday, Murphy pledged "to steer the state in a new, liberal direction...," Racioppi said.

50 more vetoes

Also on Tuesday's front page, The Record reports Christie signed more than 100 bills into law on Monday, but executed "pocket vetoes" on 50 more.

That would bring Christie's unofficial total to more than 650 vetoes -- a record for any New Jersey governor.

'Fire and Fury'

In an Opinion front column on Sunday, The Record's Mike Kelly cites "errors of fact and judgment" by author Michael Wolff, and concludes he doesn't "trust" the sensational Wolff book, "Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House."

But Kelly's reporting is hardly original, appearing many days after similar criticism from CNN's Jake Tapper, Chuck Todd of "Meet the Press" and Fox News, among others.

Wolff isn't the first to report on this chaotic, divisive presidency or suggest Trump is not only incompetent, but mentally unfit for the job.

And the deeply conservative Kelly had readers rolling their eyes when he claimed, "I'm hardly a Trump fan...."

Really? I can't recall Kelly blasting Trump as a racist, con man, serial liar and tax dodger who has divided the country more than at any time since the Civil War. 

But I do recall Kelly's reports during the 2016 presidential campaign, and his repeated pot shots at the record of Barack Obama, our first black president. 

Martin Luther King

On Monday, The Record's coverage of Martin Luther King's birthday completely missed the point.

The sub-headline said:

"Nearly 50 years after his death, Martin

 Luther King Jr.'s message

 still rings true."

But the real lesson is that nearly 50 years after his death, King's dream of racial equality is even farther away from being realized now that we have a racist president and a GOP-controlled Congress in power.

Bannon subpoenaed

Stephen K. Bannon, Trump's former chief strategist, has been subpoenaed by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.

Bannon is expected to testify before a grand jury as part of the investigation into possible links between Trump associates and Russia.

This is the first subpoena served on a member of Trump's inner circle in the probe of Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, The Times said.

Trump-Kim cock fight, Ivanka is 'dumb as a brick' and much more hilarity from D.C.

"President Trumped holed up in his White House bedroom in February 2017," according to New York magazine, which printed excerpts from "Fire and Fury: Inside Trump's White House," the explosive new book by Michael Wolff, who portrays the billionaire as a petulant idiot. Trump is shown in this illustration by Jeffrey Smith holding a Mcdonald's cheeseburger and his cellphone.

WHAT THE F? KEN ZISA RESTORED

 AS POLICE CHIEF IN HACKENSACK

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

President Trump boasting that he has a "bigger, more powerful" nuclear button than North Korea's dictator seems like a distant memory, even though that tweet appeared only 5 days ago.

Comparisons of "button" to "penis" were drowned out by excerpts in New York magazine and then publication of "Fire and Fury," an explosive new book by Michael Wolff.

Wolff, based on conversations with Trump and others, provides an inside look at this chaotic presidency, and at potentially treasonous meetings with Russians in Trump Tower during the 2016 campaign.

The headlines in New York magazine:

"Donald Trump Didn't

 Want to Be President"

"The plan to lose, and the

administration's shocked first days"

On Election Night, when Trump's actual victory seemed confirmed, Don Jr. told a friend his father "looked as if he had seen a ghost," Wolff reported. "There was, in the space of little more than an hour, in Steve Bannon's not unamused observation," when a "befuddled," "disbelieving" and "horrified" Trump "became a man who believed that he deserved to be, and was wholly capable of being president of the United States" (illustration by Jeffrey Smith).

Trump berating Jared Kushner on Jan. 29, 2017 (illustration by Jeffrey Smith).

A Trump network?

As the 2016 presidential campaign came to an end, Wolff says, "Trump himself was sanguine.

"His ultimate goal, after all, had never been to win. 'I can be the most famous man in the world,' he had told his aide Sam Nunberg at the outset of the race.... "Now Trump ... was floating rumors about a Trump network."

Steve Bannon, who became chief executive of Trump's team in August, called it "the broke-dick campaign."

Bannon also called first daughter Ivanka "dumb as a brick."

"Not only did Trump disregard the potential conflicts of his own business deals and real estate holdings, he audaciously refused to release his tax returns," Wolff reports.

"Why should he? Once he lost, Trump would be both insanely famous and a martyr to Crooked Hillary. His daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared would be international celebrities."

Electoral College

Although Trump lost the popular vote, he was elected president in the antiquated Electoral College.

"The decisions that Trump and his top advisers made in the first few months -- from the slapdash transition to the disarray in the West Wing -- set the chaos and dysfunction that have persisted throughout his first year in office."

Read about Trump's executive order excluding Muslims from the United States, his scalp-reduction surgery and use of Just for Men, his longtime fear of being poisoned (one reason why he likes to eat at McDonald's, where they don't know he is coming and the food is premade), and much more:

'Fire and Fury' excerpts in New York magazine

Ken Zisa

Ken Zisa has been reinstated as Hackensack police chief in name only, and he plans to officially retire on Feb. 1 and collect his pension.

Zisa, part of a family based political dynasty that ruled the city for decades, was charged with official misconduct and insurance fraud in 2009, and fired from his post as police chief in 2010.

He had held the job since December 1995 after serving as acting chief for about 6 months.

A jury found him guilty in 2012, but the verdicts were overturned by appeals court judges, who cited prosecutorial misconduct and missteps by the trial judge.

But after Zisa sued to get his job back, city officials insisted no judge had ever ruled that Zisa didn't commit the crimes originally alleged in the grand jury indictment.

Today, in a long column in The Record, my local daily newspaper, Mike Kelly writes about the "last gasp of the 'Zisaville' political machine" (Opinion front).

You can search the column in vain for Kelly's opinion, but all he does here is pad his column with endless background information.

The strongest thing he says is this:

"... In Zisaville, the Zisas often tried to write their own rules."

See:

When the Zisas ruled Hackensack,

 greed, nepotism and partisan politics were king

Local news?

Today's Local section is dominated by town reorganization meetings, where new members of councils were sworn in (1L, 3L and 7L).

The Glen Rock Council swore in "its first woman of color," Arati Kreibich (3L).

But the Local front carries real breaking news:

"Ponds open for skating

thanks to the deep freeze"

Restaurants

Wednesday's Better Living cover promoted "7 MOST ANTICIPATED RESTAURANTS."

But Food Editor Esther Davidowitz neglects to say whether two of them, Mighty Quinn's Barbecue and Delaney Chicken, both in Paramus, will serve anything but mystery beef, pork or poultry raised on harmful antibiotics.