These are a few things in news writing that have struck me as just plain stupid today:
Abramoff free, despite sentence
FORSAKING his trademark fedora for a baseball cap, lobbyist extraordinaire Jack Abramoff walked out of a Florida courtroom, despite having just been sentenced to five years’ jail for conspiracy and fraud.Wearing a double-breasted suit and the cap, with his wife on his arm, the one-time King of K Street — Washington’s lobbying centre — was allowed to stay free for the next few months because of his co-operation with an investigation into the buying of congressmen.
Hey, stupid: He’s walking free because that was part of the plea deal. Get a better grip on the American legal system, willya?
I’m sorry, this is just plain stupid. Like we’re ever going to see a headline that says, “Iran Timidly Rejects U.N. Demands.” Duh.
When this story first appeared, the headline and page title both said that McCloy was a minor: “Rescued minor McCloy speaks out for first time.” Annoying. Nope, no screenshot. Way to go, though, MSNBC copy editors! Too much overreliance on Microsoft’s spellchecking? Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Wow, I’m crabby today. Don’t know why; the boss walked out of here smiling after a meeting about the state of the tech manual I’ve been working on.