AmericanPapist Comments
Yup, it's crummy writin alrite.
Still, adjectives can acts as substantives, so...
Come to think of it, maybe Hilary CLINTON and Obama don't have any substance, just a bunch of adjectival hype.
Yes, and of course, as the Clinton Camp is fond of pointing out, this won't be the first time she's been in the White House, just the first time in the role of President.
I agree with Ed. To complete the crumminess, they could have said "female" instead of "woman," which would have avoided the ambiguity over whether "black" was being used as a substantive.
Tut-tut. "[B]lack" here is a noun. What's surprising is that an AP story would fail to say "the first African-American." After all, it's not unheard of for American reporters to refer to "African-American Canadians."
"After all, it's not unheard of for American reporters to refer to "African-American Canadians."
Fr. Joe,
While I've not actually ever read that from a reporter, I have heard it from the mouths of putatively educated people. Pretty funny, I have to say.
What I find stupid, speaking of Hilary CLINTON, is her dropping out of a tv debate cuz somebody dissed her daughter. Yeah, that sends a great message about a potential US President: Insult her daughter, and you can keep her from attending such and such conference.
Shouldn't it be "first woman President," or "first female President," rather than "first woman in the White House?"
I mean, Dolly Madison was in the White House, and she was a woman . . . and there probably have been quite a few other women in the building as well since then . . . a great number, apparently, during Bill Clinton's time there . . .
Black is actually a noun here, so the parallelism is correct... right?
Guys, look at the first comment.
If you watch police-related shows, in giving descriptions of suspects in some places, you will hear things like a "male white" or a "male black," rather than a white male or black male. The LA cops and prosecutors in the OJ Simpson trial repeatedly spoke that way.
I think that it is an inartful usage, but obviously some folks think it's OK.
I wrote an email complaining to the AP two days before i saw this; I'm glad I'm not crazy! The same reporter wrote an entire article on super Tuesday in the past tense. The only problem is that he wrote it at 6:30 the morning of the contest...
At least the writer got the name of the political party correct, as opposed to the propagandists who write "Democrat Party".
My new personal favorite media-ism (if I may coin a term) in the English language is the phrase "went missing" or "had gone missing." No one goes missing. Someone is either missing or they are not. In the sentence, "Sheryl's tea set went missing on Friday," the 'went' should in fact be a 'has been' or a 'had been' and the 'on' should be a 'since.' If the tea set "went missing" it seems as if it may have scampered off under its own power, as if the 'missing' can be either transitive or intransitive wherever you please. Pace Lynn Truss, but the abuse of punctuation in this country (USA) is not nearly as abysmal as our complete inability to recognize how to use more simple linguistic components like prepositions and the verb 'to be.' I blame the internet. And you Tom, specifically you.
Pace Lynn Truss, but...
Because the preposition "with" is assumed within the "pace", you don't need the disjunctive "but" at the head of the next clause...just thought I'd mention that.
Ah! Ahaha. Mr. Peters, you sly fox. Yes, I mean, of course that is correct. I might supply in my defense that my abuse of the Latin language is much more frequent than the abuses of my native tongue, but would you believe me? Thanks for the polite shiv to the ribs!
you two done good in giving the wut-for to them thosers. :)
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