Nov 2009
A Great Site to Improve Your Writing
Nov 28, 2009 14:42 Filed in: Media
Via Carmine Gallo’s new book The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs: How to Be Insanely Great in Front of Any Audience
, the Plain English Campaign is an instructive and entertaining treasure trove of free hints on writing easy-to-read text.
Supporters of the organization chose (in a 2994 survey) “at the end of the day” to be the most annoying of all clichés. Second was “at this moment in time,” which tied with the constant use of the word “like” as if it were a form of punctuation.’'With all due respect' came fourth.
Their admonition: “George Orwell's advice is still worth following: 'Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.’”
The site also provides a Javascript program, Drivel Defence, that analyzes either pasted text or a web page for over-long sentences.
The site is worth exploring.
http://www.plainenglish.co.uk/
, the Plain English Campaign is an instructive and entertaining treasure trove of free hints on writing easy-to-read text.Supporters of the organization chose (in a 2994 survey) “at the end of the day” to be the most annoying of all clichés. Second was “at this moment in time,” which tied with the constant use of the word “like” as if it were a form of punctuation.’'With all due respect' came fourth.
Their admonition: “George Orwell's advice is still worth following: 'Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.’”
The site also provides a Javascript program, Drivel Defence, that analyzes either pasted text or a web page for over-long sentences.
The site is worth exploring.
http://www.plainenglish.co.uk/
Comments
Goldman Sachs and the Brother-In-Law Strategy
Frank Rich wrote a scathing commentary today on Goldman Sachs, the financial powerhouse that played a big role in the ongoing economic crisis and yet emerged from it with huge profits, to the extent that it could afford to pay out $16.7 billion in bonuses to its management and employees.
Goldman, having received $10 billion in the initial bailout, has paid it back to the U. S. Treasury, and now claims that it really never needed the money. Rich points out, however, that $12.9 billion of the taxpayers’ money that went to bail out AIG went immediately to Goldman Sachs, to whom it owed the money as the result of its insuring Goldman’s bad debts.
And we do not know how much money the Federal Reserve pumped into Goldman as part of its efforts to preserve the banking system.
The truth is that Goldman clearly knew what it was doing all along, and calculated that the Treasury would have to bail out AIG, which would in turn reimburse Goldman for losses on its own toxic assets. It may have been legal, but if so, it was a legal scam on businesses and the public.
Think about it this way: Imagine yourself at a party where everyone, including yourself, was so drunk that they could barely get off the floor, much less drive their car home. The neighborhood is swarming with police officers with breathalyzers and there is no way you can avoid being stopped and asked to walk a straight line if you attempt to drive home. What do you do?
Simple. You find the brother-in-law of the police chief (who happens to be a guest) and ask him to drive you home. If your host has been smart enough to invite the chief himself or even the mayor, you prevail upon one of them to drive. They won’t be stopped and you avoid even the risk of being charged with public drunkenness, which is what usually happens when the driver is arrested for DUI and the passenger is too inebriated to drive the car home.
AIG was the brother-in-law. The Goldman veterans at Treasury and the Fed running the show—both in the Bush and Obama administrations—knew they couldn’t let AIG go under, and of course, they didn’t mind helping their alma mater in the process of bailing out AIG.
It’s a ripoff of Bromdingnagian proportions, but it looks like they will get away with it.
It is widely and correctly understood that Wall Street, with Goldman as a leader and with regulators in thrall, helped to inflate and profited from a credit bubble that burst and cost tens of millions of Americans their jobs, incomes, savings and home equity. American taxpayers continue to stand behind the bailouts and other government interventions that have stabilized the financial system, including Goldman, enabling the firm to post blowout profits in 2009 and to set aside $16.7 billion for bonuses so far this year.
Goldman, having received $10 billion in the initial bailout, has paid it back to the U. S. Treasury, and now claims that it really never needed the money. Rich points out, however, that $12.9 billion of the taxpayers’ money that went to bail out AIG went immediately to Goldman Sachs, to whom it owed the money as the result of its insuring Goldman’s bad debts.
And we do not know how much money the Federal Reserve pumped into Goldman as part of its efforts to preserve the banking system.
The truth is that Goldman clearly knew what it was doing all along, and calculated that the Treasury would have to bail out AIG, which would in turn reimburse Goldman for losses on its own toxic assets. It may have been legal, but if so, it was a legal scam on businesses and the public.
Think about it this way: Imagine yourself at a party where everyone, including yourself, was so drunk that they could barely get off the floor, much less drive their car home. The neighborhood is swarming with police officers with breathalyzers and there is no way you can avoid being stopped and asked to walk a straight line if you attempt to drive home. What do you do?
Simple. You find the brother-in-law of the police chief (who happens to be a guest) and ask him to drive you home. If your host has been smart enough to invite the chief himself or even the mayor, you prevail upon one of them to drive. They won’t be stopped and you avoid even the risk of being charged with public drunkenness, which is what usually happens when the driver is arrested for DUI and the passenger is too inebriated to drive the car home.
AIG was the brother-in-law. The Goldman veterans at Treasury and the Fed running the show—both in the Bush and Obama administrations—knew they couldn’t let AIG go under, and of course, they didn’t mind helping their alma mater in the process of bailing out AIG.
It’s a ripoff of Bromdingnagian proportions, but it looks like they will get away with it.
Why I don't buy or subscribe to the Clarion-Ledger
Nov 13, 2009 14:09 Filed in: Media
My wife and I had breakfast at Primos on Lakeland Drive this morning and a preowned copy of today's C-L was sitting on the table when we sat down. Thinking that it would be a good idea to catch up on some local news, I picked it up only to find Ann Coulter's column staring at me from the top of the opinion page. Yes, newspapers have the right to publish fascist venom, but not the right to be bought, read or even to be taken seriously. Publishing Ann Coulter puts the newspaper's management into the irresponsible pandering category, and illustrates why newspapers have become almost completely irrelevant. I regret the passing of newspapers, but frankly, it's impossible to have any sympathy for their plight. When they were the only game in town, they never really understood why the public bought their papers, and now that they are under the gun, they seem to be unable to learn.
Update: Walter Pinkus of the Washington Post wrote a very pertinent article in the Columbia Journalism Review:
Newspaper Narcissism - Our Pursuit of Glory Led us Away from Readers
Update: Walter Pinkus of the Washington Post wrote a very pertinent article in the Columbia Journalism Review:
Newspaper Narcissism - Our Pursuit of Glory Led us Away from Readers