European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - January 2, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse Make no mistake it errors William Safire on language Peris who Wallow in the admission of error erode the credibility of their maven Hood. But in a doubt defying feat of Clay let me rid my conscience of the most egregious of my last years language gaffes in both my language columns and my political essays so As to Start the year with a clean slate thereby to would be better than so As to but for some reason thereby has acquired an Overly formal connotation like albeit when president Clinton spoke of Quot people that Are different than we Are Quot i popped him lightly on the use of different than which is not As Strong a differentiation As different from but then went on to Sug gust fixing the end with a people who Are different from r a Lyle Sparks of Chicago thought that was an Over Nice use of the reflexive ourselves a examples of the proper use of the emphatic or reflexive ourselves he writes a Are a we ourselves have committed grammatical error and a for the Post of language guru we nominate to be Correct and direct the president and i should use a people who Are different from us on some Days in a just not myself. In a Good at history though. In comparing Boris Yeltsin a relentless pressure on a defiant parliament to Oliver Cromwell a blast at legislators unwilling to commit regicide a a it is not fit that you should sit Here any longer a a i noted Quot in the ensuing prides purge a cromwellian colonel arrested 96 reluctant legislators leaving a Tump parliament to hang the wrongly executed. A when Charles i walked out one of the oversized windows a corrected Tony Brunton of Bay Shore n.y., a onto a hastily erected Walkway and platform a which overlooked Whitehall a it was to lose his head rather than Royalty gets decapitated not hanged. More mistakes a Only by building a floating majority to wrote with political prescience could the president a build the momentum to overcome his Bete Mijoi a to which Ihor Sevcenko Dumbarton Oaks professor of byzantine history and literature emeritus at Harvard responded a keep an Eye on your this had me scratching my head until an a ooh no a came in from Evangeline Bruce of Washington a the beloved Vangy of Georgetown a with a How could you make the Bete masculine a the Black beast is a Bete Noire. In a piece on factoids bits of conjecture or misinformation masquerading As facts i described Spock of the infinitive splitting television series Star trek As an android an automaton who was similar to a human but not the same. This was by Way of giving the Woid on did a popular combining form to denote spurious sameness. A the Star trek character you cited As Spock a fans know a wrote Bruce Goldman of Richmond a is 4 i Paramount or. Spock not or. Spock. Half human and half Vulcan a but All natural making him a humanoid something like but not quite a human. Commander data from Star trek 77ie next generation is an android. So when you wrote a an android is very like a human being but is an automaton you published an Ana hyoid a something that is like but not quite a real actually in my filed copy i referred to a Cdr. Spock Quot when i meant a emr. Spock a which would have drawn angry letters from former children accustomed to feeding on demand a proofreader was Gutsy enough to boldly go where no proofreader had Ever gone before saving me on the honorific before the mistake could hit print he assumed i knew this a no Parent or Couch potato could possibly confuse or. Spock with Spock a but was slyly testing him. The new York Tumea use a la Hubble Tony Kornheiser by Day now we will find out whether the repairs to the Hubble Telescope worked or who Thor we will continue to gel pictures from space that took like a pieces of Muenster cheese caught in a screen billion dollars and we did no to even test it first. We did no to kick the tires we did no to Check the mirrors. It turned out the mirrors did no to work. Had anybody bothered to read the manual head have discovered in Fine print it said a objects Are closer than they so we had to go up and fix it. That a what we Are in America now a repair society. New National motto a we get it right eventually. Call Houston. Ask for Lou or its amazing How far we be come in the space program. We started by sending up monkeys. Now we re sending up Monkey wrenches. The next head of Nasa will probably be the Basset faced Guy who plays the Maytag repairman. The Hubble has been a Nightmare for Nasa. Speaking of nightmares How about going out to a Christmas party getting a Little Buzz on and waking up the next morning to your picture on the front Page of the newspaper sitting on the Frozen sidewalk in trendy Georgetown your skirt hiked up to your Pupick crying handcuffed to a Mailbox which is what happened to a woman in Washington d.c., the pictures of which were on Al of the Washington Post so All her friends could see. Lady Haven to you heard it a thousand times to avoid the Christmas Rush mail Early bad enough you get stopped on suspicion of Drunken driving. But handcuffed to a Mailbox what did the cops suspect her of insufficient postage what could be More humiliating than this being handcuffed to los Aspin How drunk was she that they had to handcuff her to a Mailbox was she driving through the City with a postal buddy on her Hood was she attempting to. Mail a St. Bernard to the Vatican was she singing raucously a a in a Gonna sit right Down and mail myself to Jeddah again speaking of nightmares How a you like to be Bill Clinton after what was printed in the american Spectator Page after Page about wild sex Clinton had As governor of Arkansas according to some state troopers who were assigned to him. Sex in his car. Sex on his jogs. Sex in hotel rooms. Sex sex sex preferred Arkansas pick up line a a that a a Nice tooth you but that a not the Nightmare because everybody suspected Clinton of that anyway so now it just looks like cheap piling on. No the Nightmare is the paragraph on Page 21 that quotes one of the troopers As saying about Clinton a the would pick up a baked potato with his hands and eat it in two bites. I have never seen anything like wow. State troopers they see it All. They see Road kill and people getting their Heads chopped off by wide loads. This is Arkansas Man this ainu to no disco. But a potato in two bites. Its one thing to eject a tomcat but a Slob no wonder the Guy does no to hold any state dinners. If hell do that with a baked potato i shudder to Ink about cheese cake. My problem with the american Spectator Story is that it simply Isnit Good journalism. The Story is so thick with sex that it fails to meet the minimum standards. It never answers the Basic questions 1. How big a baked potato 2. Did Clinton put Bacon or sour Cream or cheese on the potato first 3. Was silverware available to him a a 4. a right Wing rag like the american Spectator spell it a a potatoes both Clinton Bill and As he commonly refers to his wife a you know what a her name the blonde with the Law degree quickly dismissed the american Spectator Story As i should say so because who wants to elect Snuffy Smith president again speaking of Michael Jackson. Please. Is this Guy from the Moon he goes on to the other Day to try and level the playing Field. And to do that to try and gain sympathy for himself As a victim of outrageous there a that word again accusations to Calm the fears about his behaviour to represent himself As a Normal responsible 35-year-old Man he wears false eyelashes. Who Doss he think is going to be on the jury Joan Collins anyway Jackson described disown Quot Nightmare a horrible he referred to being strip searched by investigators and having his private parts photographed. The photos were necessary to determine the credibility of Jackson a accusers claim of identifying physical characteristics Well Down there. Why do i think i should mention Joey Buttafuoco a name Here these photographs will be held in strictest Confidence a until next week when you can see them at supermarkets everywhere. Jackson should consider hiring experienced Nasa astronauts Vic and Lou to help him fix his image problem. They could come Over to neverland with a Monkey wrench and a toilet plunger and pretty soon Michael a image would be As Dean and sparkling As if he were the president of the United states the Washington Post Page 24 sunday. January 2, 1994
