It seems a bit churlish to nitpick when my newsroom colleagues have worked so heroically to cover a huge storm and the final stages of a national election.
And yet - we strive for perfection all the time, whatever the odds. In that spirit, here's this week's grab bag of grammar, style and other missteps, compiled with help from colleagues and readers.
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For about 10 minutes, Mr. Williams, shirtless and handcuffed on suspicion of robbery, claimed he could not breathe, and then collapsed in the back seat of a police cruiser.
Because there is just one subject with a compound predicate, the prepositional phrase at the beginning of the sentence controls all that follows, which is not what we intended; he did not collapse “for about 10 minutes.†Add a separate subject for the second verb, to make it a separate clause: “and he then collapsed.â€
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As a potential president, you don't like him anymore than you did in the past.
We meant “any more,†that is, “by any additional amount.†As one word, “anymore†means “any longer†or “from now on.†(Another point: While “as a potential president†may look like a dangler out of context, I think in context it's clear enough that it relates to “him,†not “you.â€)
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[Caption] Two weeks before he was shot to death, Jeff Hall, was involved in a skirmish in Pemberton, N.J., at a conference of the National Socialist Movement.
No comma is wanted after the name.
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Putting down his drill, Mr. Keosky pointed to all of his neighbors who, like he and his wife, Norma, were planning to ride out the storm in Cape May.
Make it “like him,†of course.
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“I know u won't see this,†the young man wrote on one of the suspect's Facebook page, “but I'm just letting you know that I am coming for next time I see ur face or ur brother.â€
Make it “one suspect's Facebook page†or â €œthe Facebook page of one of the suspects.â€
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[Caption] Women weight lifters in the United Arab Emirates, like Amna Al Haddad, are called masculine.
Avoid using “women†as a modifier like this; we wouldn't say “men weight lifters.†Make it “female.â€
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â€Nobody wants to make a decision,†said Diane S. Hinson, a reproduction lawyer in Maryland who has created a widely referenced map of state-by-state practices on surrogacy.
Avoid this jargony verbal use of “reference.†Make it “widely cited,†“widely consulted†or “popular.â€
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The unusual spectacle of one BBC show broadcasting a hard-edged look at the journalistic integrity of another reflected the sense of crisis across Britain, as journalists, school officials, politicians and others question whether they did enough to stop decades of widely-rumored abuse by Jimmy Savile, a high-profile television personality and disc jockey known also f or his philanthropy, who is accused of victimizing some 200 girls.
No need for a hyphen in a compound modifier with an adverb ending in “ly.†(Also, the long and complex sentence could have used some surgery.)
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“It reflects the energy out there, as well as what's important in this election - going forward or back,†Stephanie Cutter, the deputy campaign manager, said when asked.
Perhaps, but that then begs the question of why it [an exclamation point in Obama's slogan] hadn't been there in the first place.
This isn't what “beg the question†means, as we have noted often. Make it “raises the question†or some other phrase.
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That virus - called Shamoon after a word embedded in its code - was designed to do two things: replace the data on hard drives with an image of a burning American flag and report the addresses of infected computers - a bragging list of sorts - back to a computer inside the company's network.
Two pairs of dashes and a colon make this sentence convoluted and difficult to read.
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Mr. Barzun was both of the academy and the public square, a man of letters and - he was proud to say - of the people.
To be parallel, the phrase after “and†must match the phrase after “both.†Add another “of†before “the public square,†or place the sole “of†before “both.â€
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Perhaps, as a result, he often says that the American people need to instruct the government on where to draw the line.
No comma is wanted after “perhaps.†(As this is written, “as a result†is parenthetical and “perhaps†seems to modify “he often says†- which is not what we meant.)
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Wall Street has invested more heavily in Mr. Romney, a former financier who has pledged to repeal Mr. Obama's new financial regulations, than in any presidential candidate in memory. Employees of financial firms had given more than $18 million dollars to Mr. Romney's campaign through the end of September and tens of millions more to the “super PACs†supporting him.
This again: no need for “dollars,†obviously.
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[Caption] President-Elect Barack Obama, far left, and Vice President-Elect Joseph R. Biden Jr., far right, make a visit to the Supreme Court in January 2009. From left, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices John Paul Stevens, Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter.
[Text] Mr. Toobin's narrative in this volume concerning the court's deliberations on the Affordable Care Act - and how Mr. Roberts apparently moved from an alliance with the conservatives to strike down the heart of the law, to his decision to uphold most of it - is dramatic and absorbing.
In the caption, we can assume readers are able to pick Obama and Biden out in a photo without the directionals. In the text, despite the repetition, we should use Roberts's title, not “M r.,†in all references.
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The commission, prosecutors charge, did not uphold their mandate and consequently did not allow the population to make informed decisions about whether to stay or leave their homes.
The plural “their†doesn't agree with the singular “commission.â€
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After answering an ad on Craigslist, things got weird.
A dangler; “answering†does not go with “things.â€
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Leading into the game, a popular train of thought ran that the Giants only had five winnable games at their disposable …
Presumably we meant “disposal.â€
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The Court of Appeals rejected a motion by a conservative group, New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms, which had accused the State Senate of violating the state's Open Meetings Law in its deliberations before it voted last year to allow gay men and lesbians to marry. The court did not provide an explanation of its decision.
As my colleague Char lie De La Fuente notes, a motion is a request to a court to do something. In this story, the purpose of the request was missing, leaving a major hole (the group was seeking permission to appeal).
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The Bloomberg administration has long trumpeted the safety benefits of its many roadway initiatives, hoping to rebuff critics who consider the policies to be undue interventions from a meddling city.
Be wary of the government jargon “initiative.†Consider “project,†“plan,†“proposal, “change,†etc.
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