Sunday, November 25, 2007
Tim Richmond's Road to Perdition
Robert Frost wrote a classic poem about roads diverging into a yellow wood. The New England poet saw only two -- the one more traveled and the one less traveled.
For Tim Richmond, there was a third.
His own road was a fast and narrow one that disappeared into the trees, dark and deep, and never came out the other side. It reached its inevitable dead end twenty years ago this month, the last time Tim Richmond climbed into a racing car.
Richmond, perhaps the most charismatic of the modern generation of American racing drivers, never made it out of the three-way woods alive. On August 13, 1989, secreted away in a West Palm Beach hospital like a grand jury witness, he died at the age of just thirty-four.
Unlike his racing, his death was slow and held under wraps. His family, unable in the end to protect their son from long-standing rumors of a cocaine habit the size of the Indianapolis infield and the apparent culmination of his high-octane lifestyle in a terminal case of AIDS, managed to pull a curtain around his last days.
His name was kept off the official list of patients at the Florida hospital where he spent his final days of life. His death was kept secret for two days while his family prepared a private burial in Ashland, Ohio, his hometown. No cause of death was ever released.
This contemporary version of a Watergate cover-up, decidedly more effective than anything Richard Nixon attempted, succeeded only in stirring the pot of rumors about Richmond's crash at the end of the fast lane and in bewildering racing colleagues and fans to whom Tim had endeared himself with his aggressive driving and pixieish personality.
It was, ultimately, so totally uncharacteristic for Tim Richmond to make his exit under a shroud of secrecy and deceit. In his dozen or so years as a race driver, he had always been a genuine article who, rather than shrink from it and hide in a forest, basked in the spotlight of publicity like a sunbather on a Florida beach.
His ascent to public adoration was fast and flawless. The son of a well-to-do auger company executive won the first Super Vee race he entered. He won his first-ever sprint car race, as well.
His father, who had indulged his son with a Porsche and an airplane on his sixteenth birthday, bought him a year-old Indy-car to carry him into the biggest spotlight of all, the Indianapolis 500, in 1980. He was twenty-four years old.
And, in a sport where some of the biggest stars have all the personality of an oily rag, Tim Richmond was a refreshing splash of cool water in the collective face of the Indy crowd. He cavorted, he quipped, he unveiled an ingratiating smile that curled up under his thin, dark mustache -- and, oh yes, he went faster than a rookie driver is ever expected to.
His 193-mph lap early in May was the fastest practice lap of the month. He crashed on qualifying day, but quickly came back to make the Indy field easily. And, all the while, he exuded the kind of enthusiasm about racing you'd expect from a ten-year-old kid who had just found his "Rosebud" sled at the back of his closet.
"I want to be another A. J. Foyt," he exclaimed at one point. "I want to do anything he can do -- only better."
When race day dawned in 1980, while more veteran drivers were closeted away in their motorhomes going through the Indy version of opening-night jitters, Tim was laughing easily with well-wishers in the garage area, signing autographs and posing for endless Instamatic snapshots.
"I'm not nervous at all," he told me then, another smile carving a large crater beneath his mustache. "I feel good. I slept good. I'm gonna go over and eat breakfast in a minute, then I'm gonna go out and do my job."
He did just that. He ran in the top ten all day, led one lap under yellow, and finished ninth, even though he ran out of fuel on the last lap and had to hitch a ride with race winner Johnny Rutherford to get back to the pit area. The snapshot of Tim's life everyone will cherish is the one of him riding on the side-pod of Rutherford's bright yellow car, demonstrating considerably more joy over JR's victory than the three-time winner could from the cramped confines of the cockpit.
"I feel good, great. I had a great race," Tim would later say of his own efforts, which made him Rookie of the Year.
But it was sometime shortly after that when the road seemed to swerve off into the darker recesses of the woods. He crashed repeatedly in the Indy-type races that followed, and his father replaced him with a more seasoned driver.
He returned to Indy the next May but failed to qualify for the lineup. He bought a qualifed car out from under another driver, which took him to fourteenth place and also tarnished some of the glitter from the year before.
Soon, he was off for Southern climes to race NASCAR stock cars. And he was an instant winner there, too. Tim won a total of thirteen NASCAR races before he was done. His previous experience at road racing gave him an advantage at places like Riverside, California, where he could outrun the stock car regulars, who were more accustomed to circling around like 747 pilots over O'Hare Airport.
In May of 1982, he came back to Indianapolis during May -- but just as a visitor. "I miss being here," he confided, strolling through the garage area in his black polo shirt, jeans, and gray snakeskin winkle-picker boots. "But I'll be back. I'm still young, so I'll have a lot of chances to come back here."
The chances would never come, though. After winning seven NASCAR races in 1986, he sat out the first half of the next season with what was described as "double pneumonia." He came back to the circuit at mid-year and, with tears in his eyes, claimed a victory at Pocono, Pennyslvania. He won the next race at Riverside, as well.
But, the same year, he also failed to show up for the first round of qualifying at Michigan International Speedway because he was asleep -- or passed out -- in his trailer in the infield.
He missed the last part of the 1987 season with a recurrence of the "pneumonia." He showed up for the 1988 Daytona 500 but was prohibited from getting on the track when he failed a drug test. He retook the test -- which had initially shown high levels of cold remedies, not cocaine -- and passed, but, when NASCAR then demanded medical records for treatments received at a Cleveland clinic -- reportedly for cocaine addiction -- Tim refused. A lawsuit followed, but Tim never raced again.
He was deep inside the yellow wood by then. And on August 15, 1989, two days late, the announcement came that he had died -- of unspecified causes. His doctor later reported he had in fact died from complications of AIDS, which he acquired through heterosexual contact.
Tim Richmond, who never married and never became another A. J. Foyt, had chosen the third road, the one that never comes back into the sunlight. And, for those of us who knew him, but briefly, it made all the sad and terrible difference.
For Tim Richmond, there was a third.
His own road was a fast and narrow one that disappeared into the trees, dark and deep, and never came out the other side. It reached its inevitable dead end twenty years ago this month, the last time Tim Richmond climbed into a racing car.
Richmond, perhaps the most charismatic of the modern generation of American racing drivers, never made it out of the three-way woods alive. On August 13, 1989, secreted away in a West Palm Beach hospital like a grand jury witness, he died at the age of just thirty-four.
Unlike his racing, his death was slow and held under wraps. His family, unable in the end to protect their son from long-standing rumors of a cocaine habit the size of the Indianapolis infield and the apparent culmination of his high-octane lifestyle in a terminal case of AIDS, managed to pull a curtain around his last days.
His name was kept off the official list of patients at the Florida hospital where he spent his final days of life. His death was kept secret for two days while his family prepared a private burial in Ashland, Ohio, his hometown. No cause of death was ever released.
This contemporary version of a Watergate cover-up, decidedly more effective than anything Richard Nixon attempted, succeeded only in stirring the pot of rumors about Richmond's crash at the end of the fast lane and in bewildering racing colleagues and fans to whom Tim had endeared himself with his aggressive driving and pixieish personality.
It was, ultimately, so totally uncharacteristic for Tim Richmond to make his exit under a shroud of secrecy and deceit. In his dozen or so years as a race driver, he had always been a genuine article who, rather than shrink from it and hide in a forest, basked in the spotlight of publicity like a sunbather on a Florida beach.
His ascent to public adoration was fast and flawless. The son of a well-to-do auger company executive won the first Super Vee race he entered. He won his first-ever sprint car race, as well.
His father, who had indulged his son with a Porsche and an airplane on his sixteenth birthday, bought him a year-old Indy-car to carry him into the biggest spotlight of all, the Indianapolis 500, in 1980. He was twenty-four years old.
And, in a sport where some of the biggest stars have all the personality of an oily rag, Tim Richmond was a refreshing splash of cool water in the collective face of the Indy crowd. He cavorted, he quipped, he unveiled an ingratiating smile that curled up under his thin, dark mustache -- and, oh yes, he went faster than a rookie driver is ever expected to.
His 193-mph lap early in May was the fastest practice lap of the month. He crashed on qualifying day, but quickly came back to make the Indy field easily. And, all the while, he exuded the kind of enthusiasm about racing you'd expect from a ten-year-old kid who had just found his "Rosebud" sled at the back of his closet.
"I want to be another A. J. Foyt," he exclaimed at one point. "I want to do anything he can do -- only better."
When race day dawned in 1980, while more veteran drivers were closeted away in their motorhomes going through the Indy version of opening-night jitters, Tim was laughing easily with well-wishers in the garage area, signing autographs and posing for endless Instamatic snapshots.
"I'm not nervous at all," he told me then, another smile carving a large crater beneath his mustache. "I feel good. I slept good. I'm gonna go over and eat breakfast in a minute, then I'm gonna go out and do my job."
He did just that. He ran in the top ten all day, led one lap under yellow, and finished ninth, even though he ran out of fuel on the last lap and had to hitch a ride with race winner Johnny Rutherford to get back to the pit area. The snapshot of Tim's life everyone will cherish is the one of him riding on the side-pod of Rutherford's bright yellow car, demonstrating considerably more joy over JR's victory than the three-time winner could from the cramped confines of the cockpit.
"I feel good, great. I had a great race," Tim would later say of his own efforts, which made him Rookie of the Year.
But it was sometime shortly after that when the road seemed to swerve off into the darker recesses of the woods. He crashed repeatedly in the Indy-type races that followed, and his father replaced him with a more seasoned driver.
He returned to Indy the next May but failed to qualify for the lineup. He bought a qualifed car out from under another driver, which took him to fourteenth place and also tarnished some of the glitter from the year before.
Soon, he was off for Southern climes to race NASCAR stock cars. And he was an instant winner there, too. Tim won a total of thirteen NASCAR races before he was done. His previous experience at road racing gave him an advantage at places like Riverside, California, where he could outrun the stock car regulars, who were more accustomed to circling around like 747 pilots over O'Hare Airport.
In May of 1982, he came back to Indianapolis during May -- but just as a visitor. "I miss being here," he confided, strolling through the garage area in his black polo shirt, jeans, and gray snakeskin winkle-picker boots. "But I'll be back. I'm still young, so I'll have a lot of chances to come back here."
The chances would never come, though. After winning seven NASCAR races in 1986, he sat out the first half of the next season with what was described as "double pneumonia." He came back to the circuit at mid-year and, with tears in his eyes, claimed a victory at Pocono, Pennyslvania. He won the next race at Riverside, as well.
But, the same year, he also failed to show up for the first round of qualifying at Michigan International Speedway because he was asleep -- or passed out -- in his trailer in the infield.
He missed the last part of the 1987 season with a recurrence of the "pneumonia." He showed up for the 1988 Daytona 500 but was prohibited from getting on the track when he failed a drug test. He retook the test -- which had initially shown high levels of cold remedies, not cocaine -- and passed, but, when NASCAR then demanded medical records for treatments received at a Cleveland clinic -- reportedly for cocaine addiction -- Tim refused. A lawsuit followed, but Tim never raced again.
He was deep inside the yellow wood by then. And on August 15, 1989, two days late, the announcement came that he had died -- of unspecified causes. His doctor later reported he had in fact died from complications of AIDS, which he acquired through heterosexual contact.
Tim Richmond, who never married and never became another A. J. Foyt, had chosen the third road, the one that never comes back into the sunlight. And, for those of us who knew him, but briefly, it made all the sad and terrible difference.
Monday, November 19, 2007
NFL: Geographically Challenged?
If you think schools haven't quit teaching geography, all you have to do is look at the National Football League "system" for grouping its teams into conferences, divisions, etc. They are supposedly based on geography, neatly divided into East, North, South, and West subdivisions.
But look a little closer, and you'll find that the NFL masterminds are about as sharp on geography as the students who, when asked to mark the location of Central America on a world map put it somewhere near Kansas (I can tell you from first-hand knowledge that they do just that, some of them anyway).
For example, Miami is in the East Division of the American Football Conference. Huh? And Dallas is in the East Division of the National Football Conference. Indianapolis in the AFC South. Need I go on?
Clearly, the NFL needs to clean up it geographical act. I, naturally, am ready with a simple solution. It would take only a few quick shifts to make things right, geographically, with the lineups of the league's teams, and maybe, in the interest of saving unnecessarily long trips and tons of jet fuel, get a stamp of approval from Al Gore even.
Here's what the NFL needs to do. To make the geography of the AFC more sensible, Miami -- now teamed up with Buffalo, New England, and the N.Y. Jets for no logical reason -- needs to be moved to the AFC South. I mean, it is south of everywhere except Key West, after all.
To make room for the Dolphins in the South, move Indianapolis, which isn't south of anything except the Great Lakes, into the North division. Then, shift Baltimore, which is more east than it is north, into the East Division.
Voila, a geographically correct lineup (the West doesn't need any such fine tuning).
Meanwhile, back at the NFC ranch, the solution would be even simpler. Just flop Dallas (East Division currently, even though it's west of the Mississippi) and Carolina (South now, but it is pretty far east, too). Leave the NFC North alone -- the Black and Blue Division just has too much geography, history, and tradition to be tampered with -- and also the NFC West, although moving the Rams from L.A. to St. Louis put it somewhat out of kilter.
Those are only quick fixes and don't deal with anything but geography. The NFL should eventually deal with its ignorance of potentially intense rivalry matchups that its current boundaries between conferences and divisions don't allow (except in the case of Cleveland and Cincinnati).
For instance, wouldn't a home-and-home series every year between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia be a great draw? Of course, it would, but it can't happen as long as one is in the AFC (North) and the other in the NFC (East).
The same holds true for St. Louis and Kansas City, and let's not forget Dallas and Houston. The idea would also need to apply those states with three teams. Somehow, the NFL has to get the Chargers, Raiders, and 49ers into the same division, and Jacksonville, Tampa Bay, and Miami, too, as well as the Jets, Bills, and Giants.
Those will take some major rehauling of the conferences and divisions, though. I'm still working on how to solve those conundrums and take advantage of the natural intrastate rivalries that aren't currently being exploited into big ticket sales.
There surely is a way. Sadly, the NFL probably won't find it any better than the Dolphins can find the end zone this season. That's the kind of geography neither of them ever was taught in school.
But look a little closer, and you'll find that the NFL masterminds are about as sharp on geography as the students who, when asked to mark the location of Central America on a world map put it somewhere near Kansas (I can tell you from first-hand knowledge that they do just that, some of them anyway).
For example, Miami is in the East Division of the American Football Conference. Huh? And Dallas is in the East Division of the National Football Conference. Indianapolis in the AFC South. Need I go on?
Clearly, the NFL needs to clean up it geographical act. I, naturally, am ready with a simple solution. It would take only a few quick shifts to make things right, geographically, with the lineups of the league's teams, and maybe, in the interest of saving unnecessarily long trips and tons of jet fuel, get a stamp of approval from Al Gore even.
Here's what the NFL needs to do. To make the geography of the AFC more sensible, Miami -- now teamed up with Buffalo, New England, and the N.Y. Jets for no logical reason -- needs to be moved to the AFC South. I mean, it is south of everywhere except Key West, after all.
To make room for the Dolphins in the South, move Indianapolis, which isn't south of anything except the Great Lakes, into the North division. Then, shift Baltimore, which is more east than it is north, into the East Division.
Voila, a geographically correct lineup (the West doesn't need any such fine tuning).
Meanwhile, back at the NFC ranch, the solution would be even simpler. Just flop Dallas (East Division currently, even though it's west of the Mississippi) and Carolina (South now, but it is pretty far east, too). Leave the NFC North alone -- the Black and Blue Division just has too much geography, history, and tradition to be tampered with -- and also the NFC West, although moving the Rams from L.A. to St. Louis put it somewhat out of kilter.
Those are only quick fixes and don't deal with anything but geography. The NFL should eventually deal with its ignorance of potentially intense rivalry matchups that its current boundaries between conferences and divisions don't allow (except in the case of Cleveland and Cincinnati).
For instance, wouldn't a home-and-home series every year between Pittsburgh and Philadelphia be a great draw? Of course, it would, but it can't happen as long as one is in the AFC (North) and the other in the NFC (East).
The same holds true for St. Louis and Kansas City, and let's not forget Dallas and Houston. The idea would also need to apply those states with three teams. Somehow, the NFL has to get the Chargers, Raiders, and 49ers into the same division, and Jacksonville, Tampa Bay, and Miami, too, as well as the Jets, Bills, and Giants.
Those will take some major rehauling of the conferences and divisions, though. I'm still working on how to solve those conundrums and take advantage of the natural intrastate rivalries that aren't currently being exploited into big ticket sales.
There surely is a way. Sadly, the NFL probably won't find it any better than the Dolphins can find the end zone this season. That's the kind of geography neither of them ever was taught in school.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Women Take A Beating (Again)
My Muslim-hating friend down in Florida just sent me an article that quotes a radical Muslim spokeman who advocates literally beating women into submission. This, he assures me, proves that all Muslims are sub-human.
Well, leaving aside the fact that one radical does not speak for all of the Islamic world, my old but misguided friend needs to take off his blinders for a moment and look around at the treatment of women by a variety of religions and sects. He would quickly see that Islam isn't alone when it comes to the subjugation of women (true, actual beating is one step farther across that line that shouldn't be crossed in the first place).
But my friend is guilty of too easily overlooking other faiths in order to nourish his hatred of Muslims. The Mormons have a long, established history of subjugating women in a variety of ways. And so do the more orthodox segments of Judaism, he should recognize (but he won't). Even some of the Amish have been guilty of the same. And have you run into any female Catholic priests lately?
Several other religious elements have mistreated women for decades, nay centuries, in other, perhaps more subtle ways.
The real issue isn't the specific advocacy of physically beating women but the whole area of subjugation of women on religious grounds. There, we should all recognize, Islam is not alone, not by a long shot, and therefore shouldn't be singled out for righteous condemnation. Condemn one, condemn them all. That's what Jesus, Moses, Mohammed, Buddha, et al, would do, I'm pretty sure.
Well, leaving aside the fact that one radical does not speak for all of the Islamic world, my old but misguided friend needs to take off his blinders for a moment and look around at the treatment of women by a variety of religions and sects. He would quickly see that Islam isn't alone when it comes to the subjugation of women (true, actual beating is one step farther across that line that shouldn't be crossed in the first place).
But my friend is guilty of too easily overlooking other faiths in order to nourish his hatred of Muslims. The Mormons have a long, established history of subjugating women in a variety of ways. And so do the more orthodox segments of Judaism, he should recognize (but he won't). Even some of the Amish have been guilty of the same. And have you run into any female Catholic priests lately?
Several other religious elements have mistreated women for decades, nay centuries, in other, perhaps more subtle ways.
The real issue isn't the specific advocacy of physically beating women but the whole area of subjugation of women on religious grounds. There, we should all recognize, Islam is not alone, not by a long shot, and therefore shouldn't be singled out for righteous condemnation. Condemn one, condemn them all. That's what Jesus, Moses, Mohammed, Buddha, et al, would do, I'm pretty sure.
Thursday, November 08, 2007
Anarchy Vs. Democracy in Language
What follows here is a "rant" that I posted in response to a blog by a dear friend and colleague at his site http://www.editorland.blogspot.com/ (which I highly recommend to anyone with an interest in editing and/or the language). It is labeled a "comment," but it honestly is a "rant" -- I should admit that up front. Mr. Editorland had mused, rather reasonably, about the eternal questions of Style (as in AP Style), and how there rarely are right or wrong answers. Whatever the boss wants to do about the final series comma, for example, is his/her choice, and we shouldn't say that it is "wrong."
I was with my old friend up to that point, but then he pointed to the late and unlamented tyrant of the Chicago Tribune, Col. McCormick. McCormick did a lot of insane things when he was running the show, including insisting that the word "freight" be spelled "frate" in the newspaper. When Mr. Editorland suggested that, while we could call such absurdities "eccentric," we couldn't say they were wrong. That tripped a switch in my head (which occurs from time to time) and prompted the following (which, I concede, is in serious need of some editing, but, under the notion that, since I am the "boss" of my blogs, anything I want has to be tolerated, I simply decline to do so):
thinkoutloud said:
Mr. Editorland and I have had numerous discussions about the troublesome final series comma, and we are generally of the same mind. When I have taught copy-editing classes that employ the AP Stylebook as their "bible," or edited publications that have sworn an oath on that very tome, I have insisted on the omission of the last comma in a simple series.
But, when I am the "boss," I usually prefer to use it. It clears up any possible confusion more times than not.
But not always, as with the classic from the TV listings: "Tonight, Peter Ustinov interviews Nelson Mandela, a dildo collector, and an octogenarian." The absence of presence of the series comma(s) can't solve that confusion, which boils down to answering the key question: How many different people was Ustinov going to be interviewing tonight?
It is a small matter, that little extra comma, I hear you say. True, but someone apparently cares about it. Else how could "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" become a best-selling book (and it's about British punctuation, not American!)?
I am a little older (but not really) and crankier, I guess, when I disagree with Mr. Editorland about granting the boss the unlimited power to change whatever he/she chooses on the basis of Preference. In my world, there still exists an alternative universe of Getting It Right that trumps the rule of Preference.
Sorry, but "frate" was never Right, no matter how much the Colonel insisted on it, no more than when he insisted on inserting editorial comment into the news columns.
I was reminded of this even more last week when one of the TV networks aired a promo for an upcoming analysis of the most recent presidential debate that promised to answer the questions: "Who Rose? Who Sunk?"
Shall we allow NBC News to justify the reconfiguration of the conjugation of a common verb on the basis that it Preferred it that way? I think not.
In my copy-editing classes, I always told students, "We do spelling and grammar in order to be correct; we do style in order to be consistent."
So, for consistency sake, I'll grant the boss his/her Preference. But not at the sacrifice of Getting It Right/Correct.
If it makes me a dinosaur to draw the line at the misuse of words like "hopefully," "comprise" (which the daily up in Indianapolis uses a lot and gets wrong every time), "flout/flaunt" (which the sports columnist for said Indy daily butchered recently when he wrote of how IU's Kelvin Sampson "flaunted the NCAA's rules"), etc., so be it (I know, I'll be extinct before too long, but that can't be helped).
Those aberrations occurred not through Preference but something quite different, Ignorance.
And if we are going to let our language be subjugated to Ignorance, as in the time of Col. McCormick (or his modern counterpart, Rupert Murdoch), we are doomed. That is what makes spending much time on the Internet, where Anarchy of language reigns supreme, so depressing.
It would be similar to letting individuals ignore the fundamental guidelines of the U.S. Constitution, with the language equivalents of that document being dictionaries and grammar books. The rule of Preference would be equivalent to letting one person, one "boss," single-handedly do away with something as basic as, say, habeas corpus (oh, wait, someone just did that; bad example). To amend a Constitution, whether for a system of government or a language, it takes a lot more than a single vote, up to and including three-fourths of the populations of all the states.
So that is the one place where I differ with Mr. Editorland. For the sake of consistency, go ahead, Boss, assert your Preference, no matter how eccentric or ludicrous.
But, when it comes to the fundamental rules of our language, residing in the land of Getting It Right, I have to paraphrase Charlton Heston and proclaim, "Not until you pry the copy of Strunk & White from my cold, dead hand."
(Footnote: If you find mistakes in my blog response, just mark them up to my personal Preference, OK?)
I was with my old friend up to that point, but then he pointed to the late and unlamented tyrant of the Chicago Tribune, Col. McCormick. McCormick did a lot of insane things when he was running the show, including insisting that the word "freight" be spelled "frate" in the newspaper. When Mr. Editorland suggested that, while we could call such absurdities "eccentric," we couldn't say they were wrong. That tripped a switch in my head (which occurs from time to time) and prompted the following (which, I concede, is in serious need of some editing, but, under the notion that, since I am the "boss" of my blogs, anything I want has to be tolerated, I simply decline to do so):
thinkoutloud said:
Mr. Editorland and I have had numerous discussions about the troublesome final series comma, and we are generally of the same mind. When I have taught copy-editing classes that employ the AP Stylebook as their "bible," or edited publications that have sworn an oath on that very tome, I have insisted on the omission of the last comma in a simple series.
But, when I am the "boss," I usually prefer to use it. It clears up any possible confusion more times than not.
But not always, as with the classic from the TV listings: "Tonight, Peter Ustinov interviews Nelson Mandela, a dildo collector, and an octogenarian." The absence of presence of the series comma(s) can't solve that confusion, which boils down to answering the key question: How many different people was Ustinov going to be interviewing tonight?
It is a small matter, that little extra comma, I hear you say. True, but someone apparently cares about it. Else how could "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" become a best-selling book (and it's about British punctuation, not American!)?
I am a little older (but not really) and crankier, I guess, when I disagree with Mr. Editorland about granting the boss the unlimited power to change whatever he/she chooses on the basis of Preference. In my world, there still exists an alternative universe of Getting It Right that trumps the rule of Preference.
Sorry, but "frate" was never Right, no matter how much the Colonel insisted on it, no more than when he insisted on inserting editorial comment into the news columns.
I was reminded of this even more last week when one of the TV networks aired a promo for an upcoming analysis of the most recent presidential debate that promised to answer the questions: "Who Rose? Who Sunk?"
Shall we allow NBC News to justify the reconfiguration of the conjugation of a common verb on the basis that it Preferred it that way? I think not.
In my copy-editing classes, I always told students, "We do spelling and grammar in order to be correct; we do style in order to be consistent."
So, for consistency sake, I'll grant the boss his/her Preference. But not at the sacrifice of Getting It Right/Correct.
If it makes me a dinosaur to draw the line at the misuse of words like "hopefully," "comprise" (which the daily up in Indianapolis uses a lot and gets wrong every time), "flout/flaunt" (which the sports columnist for said Indy daily butchered recently when he wrote of how IU's Kelvin Sampson "flaunted the NCAA's rules"), etc., so be it (I know, I'll be extinct before too long, but that can't be helped).
Those aberrations occurred not through Preference but something quite different, Ignorance.
And if we are going to let our language be subjugated to Ignorance, as in the time of Col. McCormick (or his modern counterpart, Rupert Murdoch), we are doomed. That is what makes spending much time on the Internet, where Anarchy of language reigns supreme, so depressing.
It would be similar to letting individuals ignore the fundamental guidelines of the U.S. Constitution, with the language equivalents of that document being dictionaries and grammar books. The rule of Preference would be equivalent to letting one person, one "boss," single-handedly do away with something as basic as, say, habeas corpus (oh, wait, someone just did that; bad example). To amend a Constitution, whether for a system of government or a language, it takes a lot more than a single vote, up to and including three-fourths of the populations of all the states.
So that is the one place where I differ with Mr. Editorland. For the sake of consistency, go ahead, Boss, assert your Preference, no matter how eccentric or ludicrous.
But, when it comes to the fundamental rules of our language, residing in the land of Getting It Right, I have to paraphrase Charlton Heston and proclaim, "Not until you pry the copy of Strunk & White from my cold, dead hand."
(Footnote: If you find mistakes in my blog response, just mark them up to my personal Preference, OK?)
