What's wrong with this Bound and Gagged panel?

Posted over on Tumbler this challenge: A good editor knows what is wrong with this Bound and Gagged comic today:

The answer:
The game is Whac-a-Mole (yes, I realize comic strip artists get lots of license - just testing to see how your editor's trivia knowledge is).

Capital - or is that 'Captial'- One Bowl

Oops. Editor needed on Aisle 3.

Teaching Video: Nice graphic from Poynter

If you are teaching video, especially to your reporting students, this graphic from Poynter will come in handy.

Also, I'd recommend one of my longtime favorite sites, Video 101. It breaks it down nicely with video illustrations.

For instance, how many of us have struggled through student projects loaded with jump cuts. Video 101 has a module on that.

Crash Blossom: It's nice to know the attacking bears are happy

From a Canadian site, Castanet, comes this crash blossom headline:

Spelling: Use "I" before "E" in this hed

Yes, variation is the spice of life. But when you see "var" or "variant" in the dictionary (especially one considered as liberal as Merriam-Webster), it's usually a signal to professional editors to look for the more standard spelling.

In this case, inflames would have kept this hed from going down in flames ...

Headlines: And you thought your dog made a mess ...

From the Athens, Ga., paper's online site:

Usage: Stanch/Staunch

From today's paper:

Some folks who live along Bluff Road are fighting the expansion of industrial land toward Hopkins.
Tuesday, Richland County Council weighs a request to rezone nearly 148 acres from rural to light-industrial use.
Residents say the change would conflict with a long-standing promise by the county to staunch the creep of businesses along the road leading to the Congaree National Park.

The preferred usage still is "stanch" for the verb (and there's no question if you are strictly following AP style -- Stanch is a verb: He stanched the flow of blood. Staunch is an adjective.)

An editor reads the paper, July 3, 2013

A few other things from the larder:

1) Don't make your readers go backward or connect the dots, even in a photo caption.

Reworked: Gaffney's L.J. Peak, with microphone, announces his intent to play college athletics at Georgetown, while Shaq Davidson will play at USC.  (You can't see the crowd, so why mention it?)


2) Watch the numbers - it's mostly just common sense. Consider this excerpt from a Sunday story:

 Fort Jackson has 3,500 civilian workers, who collectively are paid $51 million annually. The 20 percent furlough for the remainder of the fiscal year means those workers will have $2.55 million less to spend on gas, food, entertainment and other commodities. Shaw Air Force Base in Sumter employs another 1,340 civilian workers with a payroll of $59 million. The furloughs will cost Sumter’s local economy $2.95 million this year.

So how does a military base with 1,300 workers have a larger payroll than one with 3,500? And if you do simple division, it suggests the average per-capita salary at the fort is about $14,500 while at the air base it's $44,000. As you might suspect, the average salaries are about the same, and the Fort Jackson payroll is about $155 million. Don't let big numbers make your eyes glaze over - do simple math to break them down into understandable chunks.

(As of this writing, the wrong information is still online - another data point that too many newsrooms still don't get it - while the story was corrected in the paper this morning. Which one do you think can do more to spread inaccurate information?)

3) And not to pick only on my local paper (really, I love you all), this recent story from WLTX-TV was just a mess:

 More than 100 residents are not sitting well with a house committee decision to pass a controversial animal care bill.

Tuesday dozens of residents packed a agriculture house committee meeting, most in opposition of a bill that would limit nonprofit shelters to provide certain kinds of vaccinations to animals.

The sub-committee voted four-zero; passing the bill to the full board. Some veterinarians say this bill will even the playing field between private practices and non profits.

"It will absolutely hurt the animals. This is the most detrimental thing that could happen," said Deloris Mungo with Palmetto Lifeline.

"It has very broad language that is going to restrict what I am able to do," said Janet McKim.

Critics of the bill say it is poorly written, Janet McKim is a veterinarian at a shelter in Charleston.

 "If I don't treat it I am at risk of malpractice but if I do treat it I can be practicing outside the law, so it puts me at an extraordinarily difficult situation."

Those in support of the bill say that this is to level the playing field. But Mungo said restricting residents to only use vets to get their pets spayed or neutered is not fair.

"I have very good veterinarians but I should have the right to go to a private vet if I want to or go to a low cost spay neuter clinic if I want," Mungo said.

Richland County Representative Kirkman Finlay voted for the bill. He says the bill is needed but they need to bring more people to the table to make a fair compromise.

"Groups that are directly supported by the government that are perceived to be in direct competition with these vets are the crux of the issue. The vets are saying we are paying for our competition to come undercut us in price and that's always an issue," Finlay said.

Those in opposition says private businesses compete with non profits in every venue and they feel that this shouldn't be one that changes.

"We shouldn't be dictated to who is going to do our surgeries and how much we are going to have to pay," Mungo said.

Here's a rework. You can decide:


Dozens of opponents are upset with a South Carolina House subcommittee decision to approve an animal-care bill that would keep shelters from spaying or neutering pets.

People packed a House Agriculture subcommittee meeting Tuesday, most opposing the bill. It would limit nonprofit shelters to providing vaccinations and spaying or neutering services only to lower-income people adopting pets. All others would have to go to a veterinarian.

The subcommittee, on a 4-0 vote, sent the bill to the full Agriculture Committee. Some veterinarians say this bill will even the playing field between private practices and nonprofits, but critics say it is poorly written.

"It will absolutely hurt the animals. This is the most detrimental thing that could happen," said Deloris Mungo with Pawmetto Lifeline in Columbia. Janet Kim, a veterinarian at a Charleston shelter, complained that it has "very broad language that is going to restrict what I am able to do."

"If I don't treat it, I am at risk of malpractice, but if I do treat it, I can be practicing outside the law, so it puts me at an extraordinarily difficult situation," she said.

Mungo says restricting people to using only vets to get their pets spayed or neutered is not fair.

"I have very good veterinarians, but I should have the right to go to a private vet if I want to or go to a low-cost spay-neuter clinic if I want," Mungo said.

Rep. Kirkman Finlay, R-Richland, voted for the bill but said more people need to be involved in negotiating a compromise.

"Groups that are directly supported by the government that are perceived to be in direct competition with these vets are the crux of the issue. The vets are saying we are paying for our competition to come undercut us in price, and that's always an issue," Finlay said.

Opponents says private businesses and nonprofits compete in many areas.

"We shouldn't be dictated to who is going to do our surgeries and how much we are going to have to pay," Mungo said.
Have a happy Fourth.

Edit teach: paring down and steering away from court-speak

So you're on deadline, a verdict is in after a long trial and you've got to pound out those words. It's easy to slip into court-speak and repeat yourself.

As I sometimes post for editing teachers who want examples and my current and upcoming students, here is a story from today and my suggested edited version.

Original (611 words)

A federal civil jury took 1½ hours Tuesday evening to find in favor of Camden Military Academy and its top leaders in a civil trial over whether the school was negligent in an alleged 2008 rape case involving a cadet.

 “The Lord was with us, and we’re just so glad,” said Camden headmaster Col. Eric Boland, 55, choking up with emotion as he walked out of the Matthew J. Perry Jr. Federal Courthouse in Columbia as night fell. He was one of the three named school administration defendants in the case.

The plaintiff in the case, now 18, was seeking up to $7 million in punitive damages, plaintiff’s lawyer Marguerite Willis told the jury in her closing arguments Tuesday afternoon. Other cadets were accused of raping the teen when he was 13.

Willis told the jury it should find Camden Military Academy and three top officials responsible for not cracking down on a “climate of violence” at the school.

 “You are here to stop what is going on,” she said. “Unless you punish these people, you will never know whether this will happen to another child.”

In his closing argument, defense attorney Duke Highfield assailed Willis’ version of events, reminding the jury that Willis’ client had changed his stories about the alleged rape and other alleged traumatic incidents numerous times before testifying at trial.

The plaintiff is “an admitted liar” whose allegations about suffering sexual trauma at the hands of two other cadets only came into focus as he got closer to filing a lawsuit against the school and thought of winning a lot of money, Highfield said.

Highfield also told the jury that the three school officials who are defendants in the suit are exceptional people who have spent years developing a safe and nourishing environment at the 55-year-old school.

 “Do you think any of these educators would allow this to go on if they knew about it?” Highfield asked the jury, speaking of Boland, commandant of cadets Lt. Col. Pat Armstrong, and Command Sgt. Maj. Vertis Wilder. Armstrong and Wilder were the other named defendants in the lawsuit.

Highfield saved his most slashing attack for a key plaintiff’s expert witness, Dr. James Ballenger, who had earlier in the trial testified that the plaintiff’s different versions of events were due to post-traumatic stress disorder brought on by the rape.

Ballenger, who earned $125,000 for examining the cadet, basically sells his testimony to whoever pays him, High-field said.

“He sings whatever you want – like a jukebox,” Highfield scoffed.

That brought a rejoinder from Willis, who told the jury that Ballenger – who she said was a nationally prominent PTSD expert – had also been hired as an expert witness at times by Highfield’s law firm.

Willis had used Ballenger to explain to the jury that people who suffer traumatic events such as rape often have memory impairments of the event.

The jury began deliberating early Tuesday evening.

Over four weeks of trial, there were dozens of witnesses and numerous exhibits presented to the federal jury, composed of eight men and two women.

The State does not generally identify victims of alleged sexual assaults.

After the jury’s verdict, Highfield told The State newspaper in an interview, “It was a hard-fought case, a serious case, and we always believed in Camden Military Academy.”

Willis said, “The issues of bullying and violence in schools are important ones, and Nexsen Pruet (Willis’s Columbia firm) is proud to have represented our client in this battle. We believed in him, and continue to believe.”

Cam Walters, head of Camden Military Academy’s board of trustees, said, “We’ve got a fine school, and a fine tradition, and we’re happy to continue.” 

My suggested version (541words)

A federal jury took 1½ hours Tuesday evening to find in favor of Camden Military Academy and three of its leaders in a lawsuit over whether the school was negligent in an alleged 2008 rape of a cadet.

 “The Lord was with us, and we’re just so glad,” said Camden headmaster Col. Eric Boland, 55, choking up with emotion as he walked out of the Matthew J. Perry Jr. Federal Courthouse in Columbia as night fell. He was one of the three school administrators who were sued.

The plaintiff, now 18, was seeking up to $7 million in punitive damages, his lawyer Marguerite Willis told the jury in her closing arguments Tuesday afternoon. Other cadets were accused of raping the teen when he was 13. [It is unclear whether Willis is his only lawyer – if so, commas around her name.]

The State does not generally identify victims of alleged sexual assaults.

Willis told the jury it should find the school and its three officials responsible for not cracking down on a “climate of violence.”

 “You are here to stop what is going on,” she said. “Unless you punish these people, you will never know whether this will happen to another child.”

In his closing argument, defense attorney Duke Highfield assailed Willis’ version of the events, reminding the jury that Willis’ client had changed his stories about the alleged rape and other alleged traumatic incidents numerous times before testifying.

The teen is “an admitted liar” whose allegations about suffering sexual trauma at the hands of two other cadets only came into focus as he got closer to suing the school and thought of winning a lot of money, Highfield said.

He also said the three officials are exceptional people who have spent years developing a safe and nourishing environment at the 55-year-old school.

Along with Boland, commandant of cadets Lt. Col. Pat Armstrong and Command Sgt. Maj. Vertis Wilder were defendants.

 “Do you think any of these educators would allow this to go on if they knew about it?” Highfield asked the jury. He saved his most slashing attack for a key plaintiff’s expert witness, Dr. James Ballenger, who had testified that the teen’s different versions of events were from post-traumatic stress disorder brought on by the rape.

Ballenger, who earned $125,000 for examining the cadet, basically sells his testimony to whoever pays him, Highfield said.

“He sings whatever you want – like a jukebox,” Highfield scoffed.

But Willis told the jury that Ballenger was a nationally prominent PTSD expert who had also been hired as an expert witness at times by Highfield’s law firm.

Willis, a member of the Nexsen Pruet law firm, had used Ballenger to explain that people often have trouble remembering traumatic events such as rape.

The jury of eight men and two women began deliberating early Tuesday evening after four weeks of trial with dozens of witnesses and numerous exhibits.

After the verdict, Highfield told The State newspaper, “It was a hard-fought case, a serious case, and we always believed in Camden Military Academy.”

Willis said: “The issues of bullying and violence in schools are important ones, and Nexsen Pruet  is proud to have represented our client in this battle. We believed in him, and continue to believe.”

Cam Walters, head of Camden Military Academy’s board of trustees, said, “We’ve got a fine school, and a fine tradition, and we’re happy to continue.”

Editors (what's left of them at least) need to take special care to help. It's not fair to expect a reporter pounding out copy on deadline to be a master of conciseness. It's human nature -- as Mark Twain said, I would have written shorter, but I didn't have time.

Corporate grammar follies

It's always interesting to get on the road and see how corporate America can mangle punctuation, usage and grammar in its signs.

A recent road trip to Arkansas to see the grandkids produced its usual bumper crop of grocer's apostrophes, misspellings and funky usage.

But one that especially struck me was at a McDonald's in Olive Branch, Miss.. On both the door and the large sign out front, the signs loudly proclaimed:

We accept competitor's coupons

Uh, can we get a bit more specific there, Mickey D's? What competitor would it be - the Burger King next door? The Zaxby's across the street? The Wendy's down the road?

What the restaurant more likely meant to say was that it accepted competitors' coupons.

Then I got back here and while waiting at the DMV today was watching the ads roll by on the DMV TV network (who knew - you can't get away from it anywhere). One helpfully noted that a local body shop was "besides" a local auto dealer.

Now, you might want to go to the body shop instead of the auto dealer for your repair, but I suspect the shop wanted to say it was beside that auto dealer.

Beside = next to

Besides = in addition to or apart from

Sigh. And a pox on the next business person who, when I say I teach in a journalism school, starts going on about how "kids" can't spell, etc., these days.

(Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera handy for either one.)

Get rid of the cop speak

From The State today, a good example of how cop speak creeps into stories and how we can get it out. Also, there are questions about using an unidentified "spokesman" and some other suggestions. My comments (for my editing class) are in bold:


A 23-year-old jail guard has been arrested for allegedly shooting his pregnant girlfriend and then burning her body in woods near Eastover.

A 23-year-old jail guard has been arrested on allegations he shot his pregnant girlfriend and then burned her body in woods near Eastover. "For" still tends to convict, even with "allegedly." And it's a simple change.

   Tristan Gist, a former detention officer at Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center, is charged with murder and death or injury of a child in utero due to the commission of a violent crime, the Richland County Sheriff’s Department reported Monday. Gist was fired from the detention center over the weekend when he did not show up to work, according to a spokesman in the Richland County public information office.

… according to a county spokesman (who?). Why do we need to get into the anonymous source here if the person is a spokesman - leave the fake skulduggery to inside the Beltway. And if the person is a spokesman, do we need "public information office"? Is there a danger we might think it's a sheriff's spokesman? (And, although minor, it would be better as at the Alvin S. Glenn Detention Center.)

   Gist is being held at the Lexington County Detention Center. He must appear before a Richland County circuit court judge for a bond hearing.

The paper can use what style it wants, but in many styles (including our local style) Circuit Court is capped. But it could be written just as circuit judge. Might also be nice to explain why he's being held in Lexington County (assume it's for safety since he used to be a guard at Richland County's, but why make readers connect the dots).

   The victim has been tentatively identified as Dierra Fisher, 22, of Columbia, said Richland County Coroner Gary Watts. He said he was 99.9 percent sure Fisher was the victim but was waiting on medical records to be certain.

… said he was almost certain Fisher was the victim but was waiting for medical records to be sure. Why do we need the false-precision figure?

   Gist is accused of shooting Fisher once in the head and then driving her body to woods off Screaming Eagle Road Extension, east of Fort Jackson, and then burning her.

A small thing, but ditch the first "and then" for a comma.

   Gist brought Fisher’s two small children with him in the car as he drove to burn her body, said Sheriff Leon Lott.

Another small thing, but for brevity with him can be deleted.

   “It’s probably one of the more vicious crimes I’ve seen,” Lott said. “I keep saying that over and over. When I don’t think I can see worse, something like this happens.”   

Firefighters responding to a brush fire in the 3800 block of Screaming Eagle Extension Thursday afternoon discovered the burning body in the woods. The victim was burned so badly that the firefighters who discovered the burning body could not identify the gender.

The body was burned so badly the firefighters could not tell whether it was a man or woman.

   An autopsy determined the victim was a woman who was about five months pregnant. She died from a single gunshot to the head, Watts said.

An autopsy determined it was a woman about five months pregnant. She died from being shot once in the head, Watts said.

   But Watts had not been able to identify the woman until sheriff’s deputies arrested Gist Monday afternoon.

So the mere fact of the arrest made him conclude it was Fisher? Seems kind of tautological. Did anything else lead him to that conclusion?

   It was unknown Monday who took custody of the two children who rode in the car with Gist, said Deputy Curtis Wilson, a sheriff’s department spokesman.

It was unknown: Does that mean the sheriff's department did not know, or does it mean Wilson said he did not know, or did the kids just disappear into thin air? Avoid the passive that diffuses responsibility. And you can delete who rode in the car with Gist; those are the only two children mentioned in the story and it already establishes they rode with him.

   Gist was the father of one of the children, according to reports. It has not been determined whether Gist was the father of Fisher’s unborn baby.

Whose reports? Police? Media? Twitter? Message in a mayonnaise bottle? And who is doing this "has not been" determining. Another passive that diffuses things. Who said this?

   No one had reported Fisher missing or called the coroner’s office about the victim when the burning was first reported, he said. She has family in Orangeburg, New Jersey and Kansas, and those relatives have been notified.


Who is the "he" here - Watts or Wilson. Who said they have been notified? And why use "the victim"? Just say "her."

   Investigators received a tip Monday morning from someone in the community that Gist might be a suspect in the shooting and burning. From there, the investigation progressed quickly, Lott said.

From someone in the community - what community? Better yet, unless it came from Mars, the default is it's probably going to have been in the community. Is that really needed? If he won't say who, just say that. Same thing with in the shooting and burning. Have we been talking about anything else?

   Several officers went to Gist’s home to make the arrest, and he was apprehended without incident.

Officers went to Gist's home where he was arrested without a struggle. If it's plural, we can assume "several." That adds nothing. And if these were sheriff's "officers," wouldn't "deputies" be more correct?

   Gist admitted to the shooting death and burning, Lott said.

   Gist has no prior criminal record, according to a rap sheet from the State Law Enforcement Division. He was hired at the detention center on May 14, 2012, according to a county spokesman. Other details about Gist’s employment, including his certification as a jail guard and his educational history, were not available Monday.

Gist has no criminal record. Or, if you want to be absolutely on the fine point: Gist had no criminal record. (He obviously has one now.) "Prior" isn't really needed. We can debate whether you need according to a rap sheet from - is the form important or just that it's according to SLED.
He was hired at the detention center May 14. Since it was last year, 2012 isn't needed.
And there's that ghost county spokesman again.

   Fisher’s killing was the third deadly incident of domestic violence in the past week in Richland County.

Fisher's killing was the third death related to domestic violence … 
I'd also suggest during the past week just to change up the prepositions, but that's small potatoes.

   On Feb. 25, Percy Williams, 31, was charged with murder after he allegedly shot and killed his girlfriend, Tabatha Priester, 35, the sheriff’s department reported. On Feb. 26, 28-year-old Adam Jurgen died in a hail of gunfire after he got into a shootout with sheriff’s deputies who were searching for him after he allegedly beat his girlfriend.

If you're keeping score, that's Sheriff's Department under AP style because it refers to a previously named department in the story. But that's the least of our worries, and the newsroom is entitled to its own style.

Hold that apostrophe

So, should one worry when the athletics department at one's university can't use punctuation properly in forming a plural?  (As in there shouldn't be an apostrophe.)

Now that it's in the banner, it probably will be repeated every year. Sigh.

Always ask "Why"

Here is a story that's a good example of failing to ask many of the right questions (if they were asked, it doesn't show).

The headline holds great promise:

How SC keeps mental-health data from gun database 

South Carolina is not passing critical information about residents with mental illness along to the federal government, leaving the door open for potentially violent people to buy firearms, critics say.

This lack of a sharing, paired with a flawed federal system, could one day yield deadly results, according to a growing chorus of state leaders, lawmakers and parents.

Sounds like a pretty good look at how and why South Carolina isn't sharing this information, right?

Except nowhere in that story can I find the how or the why.

The how, I guess, is fairly simple - it just isn't doing it. But why isn't it doing it? Nowhere does reporter Gina Smith, whose work I respect, actually tell us. She dwells on the case of a woman with mental health problems who got a gun and tried to fire it outside a school. She tells us the state's attorney general, Alan Wilson, is upset and he and some lawmakers are preparing legislation that would require the state to share mental health information with the federal database.

She tells us:

South Carolina rarely provides mental health records to an FBI database for gun background checks.

That means the FBI cannot enter that information into a database, called the National Instant Criminal Background Check System or NICS. Gun-store owners around the country rely on the database to alert them when a potential buyer is ineligible to purchase a gun.

It's up to state governments to share their data including mental-health records, proof of citizenship, criminal and drug-abuse histories and more.

And:

South Carolina shared only 17 mental-health records from the time the database came into existence in 1998 to October 2011, according to a report by Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a coalition of mayors from across the nation working to help law enforcement target illegal guns. Eighteen other states provided even fewer records, according to the report.

Colin Miller, a law professor at the University of South Carolina's law school, said the NICS system does not provide adequate information that gun stores and others who sell firearms need.

"There is a lot of information that should be there that isn't. There is a lot of missing data," Miller said. "There are a lot of reasons why it's not there. Bureaucracy, red tape. And there's not anything that incentivizes states to provide that information to NICS.

"And there are no enforcement mechanisms to punish them for not providing it."

Officials in some states say the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act prevents them from turning over such records to the FBI. They also say there is no money to create a system to collect the records from health agencies and courts, and no laws requiring it.

Wilson would not speculate on why South Carolina does not do it.

And that's it. One dismissive line - the attorney general would not speculate. So why not dig for the answer to some basic questions:

• Whose responsibility is it to turn them over?
• Why isn't that person or agency not doing it?
• Who turned over the 17 and why hasn't that person or agency turned over more?
• Are there privacy (HIPAA) concerns or conflicts specifically in South Carolina?
• Did I miss it, or why is no one from the state Mental Health Department quizzed at length on all this?

All in all, the story essentially becomes an extended news release for Wilson. It talks past a lot of these issues by referring to other states or national organizations - or to Miller, whose insights are valuable but who does not address South Carolina's failing specifically.

But it never drills down into South Carolina to see who is or is not responsible (if no one is responsible, that's a good story in itself) and if someone or some agency is responsible, why that responsibility isn't being carried out.

As quoted by Brant Houston in "The Investigative Reporter's Handbook":

Newspaper editor Tom Honig wrote in The IRE Journal that "most good investigations come down to one of two things -- either a process did not work or people did not follow the guidelines."

Smith's story provides neither answer and essentially becomes a big shrug combined with a bit of hand-wringing. But government without responsibility is chaos, and it's our jobs to penetrate the surface and tell people whether there is malfeasance, nonfeasance or just cluelessness.

We can and should do better.

Chuck E. Cheese can't spell

Found this on one of those mechanical horse rides at a Chuck E. Cheese in North Little Rock, Ark.

Sigh. Starting them out misspelling* so young. No surprise that when they get to me in college they are confused.

*Look at the last direction. (And whoever did this was so careful to include the periods, too, but missed the big one.)

Usage: First come, first ?

Having seen this phrase misstated again (today in a registrar's message in a graduation supplement to The Daily Gamecock), I realize it's time for another reminder.

The phrase is first come, first served.

Not first come, first serve.

The "d" at the end is part of it -- as in those who arrive first are served first, not those who arrive first get to serve first.

Bad layout - Football players, sexual predators

One wonders if those laying out The (Columbia, S.C.) State today folded the paper in half, stepped back and took a look at the layout.

Hint: Always try to look at the page as two half pages, because that's how many of your readers will see it.

(Thanks to Augie Grant for the photo, which I was about to take when his arrived in my email.)

What happened to the complete story?

This is just the latest in what I see as a disturbing trend - and, yes, I will use that word because I am seeing more of it and fairly regularly - of either:

•  Reporter (and by extension editor) timidity 
• A failure to understand a basic underpinning of journalism - anticipate readers' questions, answer them and, if you don't know the answer, simply say so.

Consider this story from today's The State.

Lower Richland's playoff hopes smashed

Diamond Hornets learn at end of Thursday’s practice they are ineligible for tonight’s long-awaited game

By AKILAH IMANI NELSON

COLUMBIA, SC — This was shaping up to be the season for which the Lower Richland football squad had long awaited.

After earning a playoff berth for the first time since 2007, the 2012 Diamond Hornets rolled into Blue Ridge as underdogs and came away with the program’s first playoff victory since 1995.

“To see those guys’ faces last week after the win, it was a great feeling. I’m glad to be playing in Week 12 that’s for sure,” said coach Daryl Page on Thursday as his team prepared for a second-round game at Daniel tonight. “There are teams with better records that have already taken inventory.”

But at the end of their practice, the Diamond Hornets’ determination turned to despair.

They were notified that the squad had been declared ineligible for postseason play due an ineligible player on the roster.

“Even though we are appealing, we will not be able to go and play a game tomorrow night,” Page said.

Blue Ridge will play Daniel instead.

The anticlimactic end of the Diamond Hornets’ journey through the postseason does not nullify the progress they have made in 2012.

“It’s a step for us, as far as where we’re going with the program,” Page said.

The coach, who led Wilson to a Class 3A title in 2007, said his goal at Lower Richland is a state title, and this season the Diamond Hornets were headed in that direction.

As the program’s third coach in four seasons, Page met little resistance from the Diamond Hornets, whose quick adaptation to his style and expectations put them on the path to success.

Lower Richland (5-6) started the season 0-3, but went on to a third-place finish in Region 4-3A.

Page said, “Once we experienced success, we really enjoyed the feeling. But we want to move from the feelings to the expectations.”

“We want it to be a yearly thing, where Lower Richland is one of the teams that you talk about at the end of the season. We want to be a program that is in that conversation every year. Daniel is already there, and that’s where we’re aiming,” Page said.

“Instead of it being a surprise, it should be an expectation,” he said.
For the players, that was already sinking in.

“We felt like could win every game we played,” said end Alonzo Gibson, one of 16 seniors on the team. “We worked hard for it, and we knew we could do it.”

“We went up (to Blue Ridge) expecting to win,” added receiver Devonta Hampton.

And though they reached the end of the road sooner than they hoped, the Diamond Hornets expect to win again.

Even if they must wait until 2013 to do it. 

 So now a couple of quick quiz questions for those playing along at home:

• What player?
• Why ineligible?
• Why was an ineligible player playing?

Were those questions even asked?

If they weren't, there are bigger problems here that the reporter and assigning editor really need to address. But if they were and there weren't any answers, well, it's perfectly fine to say so in the story. Readers don't expect perfection; they just want to know the rent-a-clue truck has passed our neighborhood.

I don't know in this specific case, but I have run into cases where reporters have said they didn't want to "pry" and put some kid in a jam. Here's the deal: We pry. That's what we do. And you don't have to ID the student. But asking those sorts of questions could lead to others, especially the one about why an ineligible player played. If the coaches didn't know, was there a breakdown in important communication? Was there some kind of lag that could jam coaches and players up again? How do things like this happen?

(And such information could even give readers an idea of whether that appeal might succeed.)

It's more than a sob story. Sometimes we actually uncover things that need fixing.

But we need to ask the questions - and then tell readers that at least we have.

Writing coach Jim Stasiowski once had a great column on this. It's only gotten worse, from what I can see.

Numeracy Illiteracy - the headline edition

I suppose I should be grateful that my local paper, The State, gives me such timely material for teaching.

But even though we were discussing numeracy in editing class, the paper didn't have to be this accommodating with this headline today:

Here's the first part of the story:

South Carolina’s $25 billion retirement fund earned a 4 percent return on its investments from July to September, the fund’s chief investment officer told the State Budget and Control Board on Tuesday.

But Hershel Harper said the fund will struggle to make its goal of a 7.5 percent annual return over the next five years. State officials say the fund needs to average that return to stay solvent .... The retirement fund made a 0.37 percent return on its investments last fiscal year, which ended June 30. After paying its expenses , including benefits to retirees and fees, the fund lost $1 billion in value. 

So , no, earnings weren't up 4 percent. The percentage here is not being used as a relative comparison but as an absolute - it's a rate of return.

Had the earnings been "up" 4 percent, that would be 0.37*1.04, or 0.385 percent.

Because the rate of return is an absolute number, the "up" or increase in it would actually be 13,233 percent! ((4/0.37)-1)*100

Think of a thermometer - with the rates of return sot of like the "degrees." If the temperature went from 20 to 50, you wouldn't say "temperature up" 50 degrees. You'd say "temperature reaches 50" or maybe that it rises 30 (or, if you were into headlinese, "temperature up 30".
 So this headline really should be:

Earnings reach 4 percent in quarter

or a little less elegantly

Earnings rise to 4 percent in quarter

This kind of innumeracy isn't good in any case, but in 36-point type it really disappoints.

(The online version avoided the problem.)

How a newspaper is a convicting a man before trial

The case of a missing Richland County teenager continues to make headlines here - and to tug at the heartstrings of those searching for Gabrielle Swainson. The local sheriff has called a man arrested in the case a "monster."

Sheriff Leon Lott, no slouch when it comes to media savvy, continues to spin the story like a twister coming out of the plains. And it's hard, from the details that have come out so far, to not feel a sense of dread about Swainson's fate and a desire to see justice done.

Which is even more reason for the local media to keep a cool head.

Apparently The State newspaper missed that basic idea of journalism back in school, because it seems hellbent on convicting the suspect before trial: specifically reporter Noelle Phillips - but even more important, the editors who are supposed to have the smarts to keep a level head in all this.

Let's start with this headline of Aug. 29:

The quote marks are unlikely to mitigate that the paper has just called him a "monster." In fact, during the years at American Copy Editors Society meetings, readers panels have told us they often don't see the quote marks as attributing it to someone else but as the paper being snarky.

That was followed by this lead:

A man described as a monster and a career criminal forced 15-year-old Gabrielle Swainson from her home in the wee hours of the night on Aug. 18 and took her to his burned-out house on a dirt lane in Elgin.

 What happened in that house is unknown, but there is clear evidence of foul play, Sheriff Leon Lott said Tuesday.

 Now, 52-year-old Freddie Grant, is in jail on kidnapping and federal gun charges, refusing to cooperate with the FBI and sheriff’s investigators, who were searching for Gabrielle.

 “A monster came in that morning and did something that only happens in our nightmares,” Lott said.

I have real problems with that opening paragraph being unattributed. It's Editing 101 - when you make serious accusations, don't leave them naked - the two-graf, attribution in the second graf lede doesn't work well. First, some of your readers won't make it to graf 2 (a major part, actually, called "scanners"), and some others will have that first graf stuck in their heads and not make the clear connection that Lott is saying both things.

(While we're at it, I have the same problem with the third graf. Is Lott also saying that or is the paper divining it?) 

Apparently, The State thought better of itself, because online it tacked an "authorities said Tuesday" onto the end.

Then, today, we've got this:

The mystery of how an accused kidnapper entered the home of missing teen Gabrielle Swainson has been solved after investigators found a key inside the suspect’s house, Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said Wednesday.

Maybe the editors at The State missed it in Editing 102 when this came up (probably slept in), but they could always have referred to the AP stylebook:

To avoid any suggestion that an individual is being judged before a trial, do not use a phrase such as accused slayer John Jones; use John Jones, accused of the slaying.

Add to that the overall tone "mystery .... has been solved" and compound it by the subhead above it:

Any number of good texts on journalism and language (the editors might try Jack Cappon's put out by AP that was originally known as "The Word" -- hey, I know times are tough in newsrooms, but you can get a copy of it used for 1 cent plus $3.99 shipping; give  me a holler and I'll send you the $4) will tell you the connotation of words is as important as the denotation and that "claimed" has a pejorative, hands-on-hips, disbelief connotation.

Let's also add the definitive statement that he "entered" the house to the list.

But what's a little skill with the language among friends who are supposed to be professionals about it, eh?

Maybe something like this?:

A key to missing teen Gabrielle Swainson's house has been found in the home of the man charged with kidnapping in her disappearance, Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said Wednesday.

Or

The man charged with kidnapping in teenager Gabrielle Swainson's disappearance had a key to her house, and it was found in Freddie Grant's house after Grant said it had been lost, Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said Wednesday.

No wonder the suspect's lawyer has asked for a gag order. Too bad it can't also include a suggestion that Phillips, but especially the editors at The State, go back and think about some of the principles of fairness and balance that got most of us into this business in the first place.

Trust me, I think they'll sell just as many copies. Let the story tell itself instead of becoming a tool.

Update 09/07: Roy Greenslade of Britain's The Guardian also weighs in.

Sununu - red in the face? NY Times has him that way.

So I was pointed to this caption on a NY Times video by the weekly roundup from World Wide Words (one of the best sites on the Web, IMHO).

The former governor of New Jersey John Sununu is a fierce supporter of Mitt Romney, and prone to going rouge, often saying the things the Romney campaign can't.

Oops - that should be Sununu going rogue, not "rouge."

An easy-to-make error. But there's a bigger error (not caught by the folks at WWW): Sununu isn't former governor of New Jersey, but of New Hampshire.

While we're at it, drop the comma after "Romney" and go for a more elegant phrasing: Former N.H. Gov. John Sununu is a fierce supporter of Mitt Romney and is prone to going rogue, ...

Here's a shot of the Times' error on Shelf3D.

It's also on YouTube. (The perils of modern multiplatform distribution.)

Yet another reason all work should get a glance by an editor.