Burke: If you looked for election news, you came to right place

Published 1:30 am Wednesday, November 8, 2023

By Tom Burke / Herald Columnist

Two thoughts today.

First: The voting is over. The ballots are a-counting and the winners and losers are either taking bows and picking out new curtains for their office; or weeping in their beer trying to keep the pretzels from getting tear-stained and soggy. (Or, in the case of a typical MAGA loser, either lying about the vote count, demanding a recount, or saying, “It was stolen.” (Stollen?)

But the real winner this cycle has been the voter, specifically, the Herald-reading voter.

I doubt The Daily Herald’s staff will toot its own horn about this, so I will.

I have never seen, in all my time around the news (over 50 years at the local, state and national level), a newspaper do a better job covering an election.

The paper offered the discerning reader (meaning you, of course) an exquisite menu of thorough analyses; interviews with the candidates; position recaps (culled from public records where aspirants have been so arrogant or so inculcated into the idea of “fake news” they’ve refused any contact with the media); and the editorial board’s endorsements, for those who like to gauge their perspective against some folks who spend considerable hours studying political people and positions.

Now as of this writing on Monday, I have no earthly idea who won what. Except I know The Herald’s readers won the opportunity to cast the most informed ballot in years.

Admittedly, I haven’t measured column inches devoted to this year’s election against previous years, so I can’t say with empiric certainty how comprehensive 2023’s coverage was; but I can say that whenever I picked up the paper (every day) there were articles upon articles devoted to school board, city, county and other races.

It was impressive; overwhelming; and precisely what any community could wish for from their local newspaper: professional thoroughness, journalistic impartiality, and even an expanded “Letter to the Editor” section for readers’ opinions.

Well done, Herald.

Second; There’s a problem with that word.

There is a word that is causing me no end of grief. It’s overused, wrongly used, and put where it doesn’t belong a million times a day. Whenever I see it in a sentence I want to grab an editor’s red pencil and make the “delete” mark editors are so good at making. (Editor’s note: It’s kind of a curlicue, written over the word.)

Most people think that I’m crazy, however. They don’t see a problem. They think that because everyone does it, it isn’t wrong. How could they think that? Everyone who ever sat through English in grammar school (Grammar, as in the use of the English language, school) learned the proper usage of the word.

I’m going to have to dig out my old copy of Edwin Newman’s “Plainly Speaking” to discover if that was a problem for him, I may even have to refer to his “Plainly Speaking II” to see if that’s there.

I know that he had a lot of good advice for English-as-a-primary-language speakers. I seem to recall that he thought that people who learn English as a second language, once they absorbed all the rules that make English such a difficult language to learn, used better grammar than those of us that learned it at our parents’ knee.

So why do I dislike that word so much? That’s a good question.

I believe one reason is that now that I am conscious of word count (editors say, “Give me 900 words on….”) I am more parsimonious about how I use my allocations.

I also think that using that word doesn’t add clarity, make sentences flow “better,” or bring readers along to the sentence that comes next or the one that comes after that.

Sure, there are proper times and places to use that word. Just like there’s a proper time and place to use dynamite, castor oil or fabric softener. It’s just that that word should be used in moderation. It should be written into a sentence with care and concern, and for me at least, to demonstrate one’s mastery of basic writing skills.

Another question: Can a paragraph be written without using that word?

It’s an interesting question. Perhaps a description of a snow-covered peak on the peninsula could be written sans the proscribed word. Could a political commentary concerning the latest Trump indictment be scratched out without stringing those four over-used letters together? I’d like to think so.

I know I can write a news story and keep the offending bit of language at least down to a dull roar. I also know when I finish a sentence, or paragraph, or story I give one read just to insure I didn’t break my own rules.

So what is the offending word? Perhaps some have figured it out.

Because that’s what I’m talking about. That. T-h-a-t.

Today many seem to use “that” as the written 21st century equivalent to the ‘70s, ‘80s and 90s conversational “like.” Like, you know man, like we use that word far too much, and it, like, makes us sound like we don’t know, like, what’ we’re talking about.

What to do with a surfeit of “that’s?” First, thank Bill Gates or Steve Jobs’ ghost or someone for the “Delete” key. Next, use it. Finally, feel good, because that’s a good way to feel and everyone wants to feel that way, good about what they do.

Slava Ukraini.

Tom Burke’s email address is t.burke.column@gmail.com.