This page describes the Orwellian experience I had reading the Wall Street Journal’s obituary for William Safire on 27 September 2009. I admired Safire’s writing and his style, and I think the WSJ did shoddy justice to both, in their article and in the way they handled my critique.
It started when I saw this Google summary:
I posted a comment on the WSJ web site twitting them on the irony of the grammatically poor first sentence. (Namely, Safire was a grammarian who would never let copy like that go through. Who wrote that? Who hired them? Who reviewed it?)
I didn’t belabor the other shortcomings of that awful sentence. See below for my contrary view.
In any case, in a few minutes later the sentence online was rewritten... and my comment had vanished. It must have been deemed doubleplusungood. Here is the revised sentence.
I then posted this comment. We’ll see if the second comment lasts in the public record. In any case, I think the WSJ flattered themselves in imagining that Safire had their back, just as they erred in thinking they had his.
(Note that my second “it” was ambiguous: the screen shot I referred to was of the original article, not my first response. I wish I had been more assiduous about documenting what I said... I was not expecting to be “disappeared” like that?)
I mean really — the 70s a dismal music decade?
Even Frampton Comes Alive and Saturday Night Fever, for Gods sake. Furrfu! There was great, and fun, and great fun music. Now, as for fashion, I have no idea. But what a pointless, gratuitous, idiotic swipe.)
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