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Wednesday, August 17, 2016

But Its Just Punctuation and Speling

I was reading Article A - http://theweek.com/articles/642914/how-republicans-rebuild-after-civil-war - in which the author quotes himself from Article B - http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Social+adjustment%3A+Washington's+young+conservatives+ponder+life+in...-a0155288624 - which he wrote 10 years ago.

Here's the crazy part. In the process of quoting himself, he added a usage error. This is the part of Article B that is being quoted, which is correctly stating:

If it were more like me, the Republican Party would be better off. It's failing because it's like you.

Image from Article B:


That reads fine. No issue. In fact, if there was a usage error in an article that was composed a decade ago, I would likely dismiss the error as a legacy document that can't or shouldn't be changed. But oh no, that's not the case. It's in Article A - which was composed August 16, 2016 (yesterday!) that has the usage error! Here it is:

"If the GOP we're more like me, the party would be doing better. It's failing, because it is like you."

Image from Article A:


The author meant to write "If the GOP we are more like me, the party would be doing better. It's failing, because it is like you." Really? Are you sure? Perhaps it's the high standards of writing which are failing because its like you.

Editor's Note: Yes, there are two deliberate mistakes in the title of this post. Also, yes, the articles referenced within this post are worth reading for reasons in addition to the usage error.

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