By MERVIN BLOCK
November 2006

Does this script make any sense—or am I just dense?

A network anchor said, “It will take place across the country tomorrow morning, and if you didn’t know it was coming, there’s no way you would know.”

If I didn’t know it was coming, I wouldn’t know what? Know that it was coming? Know that it had arrived? Know what it is?

That snippet from a script was broadcast recently by the anchor of NBC’s Nightly News, Brian Williams, who’s also the managing editor. I was told about the script by a television network producer in Australia, Matthew McGrane, who said he was baffled. I hadn’t seen that newscast, but I’ve confirmed the text–and the context—delivered by Williams:

“We are back this Monday night with NBC News In Depth, an American milestone. It will take place across this country tomorrow morning, and if you didn’t know it was coming, there’s no way you would know. It wasn’t all that long ago [delete all that], November 20th of [delete of] 1967, President Lyndon Johnson was giving a speech at the Commerce Department in Washington. The crowd started to applaud, noticing what was going on behind him. [Better: “The crowd noticed what was going on behind him—and began to applaud.”] The President turned around just as the huge digital counter above him, state of the art [cliché] at the time, cranked the estimated U-S population to 200-million. A lot of Americans thought we had grown just about as big as we ought to get, but, of course, we didn’t stop there. Well, tomorrow morning at 7:46 a.m., Eastern time, and don’t ask us how they estimate it, the U-S population will click over to 300-million….” (Nightly News, Oct. 16, 2006.)

The NBC script referred to 7:46 a.m.in the morning. A.M. is the abbreviation for ante meridiem, which means “before noon.” So a.m. in the morning, as journalism students are taught, is tautological. [Thanks to sharp-eyed reader Gil Haar for setting me straight on what A.M. stands for.]

An intelligible rewrite of the lead:

“The U-S population will reach an estimated 300-million tomorrow morning, and if you didn’t know that moment was coming, you wouldn’t realize it had passed.”

The next night, Williams said, “There is, as expected, news tonight about that American milestone that we were just at the cusp of when last we spoke last night. This morning, at 7:46 a.m., and again don’t ask us how anyone figures this out….” If there’s news, why not tell us what it is instead of taking the time to tell us there’s news when we already know we’re watching a newscast.

As expected is a news-appetite depressant. So is that clunky writing. And again, 7:46 a.m. in the morning.

How often is Nightly’s tonight not tonight? Almost nightly, it sometimes seems. Just the other night, on Oct. 31, Williams said, “We’ve learned tonight that after 50 years in the business, Bob Barker says he will retire this coming June….” We’ve learned tonight? They must be slow learners: The Associated Press moved a story about the retirement in mid-afternoon. It showed up at Nightly’s newsdesks at 3:39 p.m., EST, more than three hours before Williams said, “We’ve learned tonight.”

Another question occurs to me when I watch Nightly News: what does Williams mean when he introduces a story by saying “There’s word tonight”? Let’s examine one such story:

“There’s word tonight a notorious Utah polygamist who’s been on the run and the F-B-I’s list of America’s most wanted has now been captured.” (Aug. 29, 2006.) Sounds to me as though he’s suggesting the story broke that night. But more than eight hours before that newscast, at 10:17 a.m. EDT, The Associated Press reported the capture occurred the night before.

At best, there’s word tonight is ambiguous. Otherwise, you’d expect an anchor to say merely, “A notorious polygamist on the F-B-I’s list of most wanted has been captured.” (The polygamist was wanted, so there was no need to say he was on the run.) As for the phrase “There’s word tonight,” it’s past time to put it on a list of the most unwanted.

Another questionable Nightly script:

“As we first reported here last night, the book paints a picture of dysfunction and deception at the highest levels.” (Nightly News, Sept. 29, 2006.) First reported? That means reported first. But CNN reported the publication of Bob Woodward’s new book shortly before 4 p.m. the previous day. First reported could also be interpreted as the first time we reported it. But why would anyone use it in that sense?

Although the newscast is called Nightly News, it could easily be called Tonightly News. The word tonight is sprinkled throughout scripts liberally. On Nov. 1, 2006, Williams used tonight twice in one sentence—after using it in the preceding sentence. “And for more on where this daylong political saga stands as we speak tonight, we go to Tim Russert. Tonight finds our Washington bureau chief in Orlando, where he is moderating the Senate debate at the University of Central Florida tonight.” Yes, he began and ended the second sentence with tonight.

While we’re at it, let’s look at some other flawed excerpts from Nightly News:

“The North is threatening to do it again, blow off another nuclear weapon, if not several more.” (Nightly News, Oct. 17.) Blow off? Dictionaries say it means to ignore, or to outperform in a contest, or to end a relationship with, or to fail to attend. The writer probably meant blow up. Or set off. Or explode. Or detonate.

After the anchor’s lead-in, a correspondent said, “NBC News has been told by U-S officials that North Korea’s military has informed China it intends to explode not only one nuclear test but a series of underground nuclear tests.” A test isn’t exploded; a bomb is. Further, the use of not only requires but also.

“There’s health news to report tonight.” (Nov. 2, 2006.) So report it–without delay.

“But today the president assured them, they’ll be back there in just a few months’ time.” (Aug. 2, 2006.) A month is a measurement of time, so there’s no need for time.

More than 20 years ago, the then editor of Nightly News, Gilbert Millstein, put together a small styleguide, which pointed out a common error: starting a sentence with a singular subject and switching to an object that’s plural. But apparently not everyone is familiar with it:

“Ask a senior citizen in this country what organizations they belong to, and there’s a good chance they will mention A-A-R-P.” (March 2, 2005.) The singular citizen and the plural they? No way.

Another Nightly script: “There is a follow-up on our top story here [delete here] last night about the rapidly deflating [better: weakening] housing market. Last night we reported on that sharp drop in existing home sales. Well, today we learned [everything newscasters say on the air is something they’ve learned] new home sales also have dropped sharply, down four-point-three percent last month. That is the largest percentage drop since February. The inventory of unsold homes. sitting on the market across the country, also climbed to a new record high.” (Aug. 24, 2006.) Lead with the news; news is what’s new. New record is an old redundancy; if the inventory climbed to a new high, that is a record.

We’d better rewrite the script; using only facts found in the original, we’ll ditch there is–a dead phrase–and make it newsy:

“New home sales dropped sharply last month—down four-point-three percent. That’s the largest drop in five months. And the number of new homes on the market across the country rose to a record high. Sales of existing homes, reported yesterday, fell sharply.”

The original is 74 words; the rewrite is 41–shorter, sharper, stronger.

The previous evening, the anchor said, “The news today [isn’t today’s news what a newscast is all about?], sales of existing homes fell four-point-one percent in the month of July to their lowest level since January of 2004.” July is a month, so month is superfluous. Similarly, you wouldn’t say, “I’m going to paint my car the color purple.” You’d say “I’m going to paint my car purple”—and skip color. Also: do the math for the listener; instead of citing January 2004, it’s preferable to say the sales had fallen to their lowest point in two and a half years.

That script was broadcast August 23, so July was the previous month. In conversation—and broadcast writing should be conversational—we’d refer to July as “last month.”

Another departure from conversationality on Nightly:
“Now to the White House, where President Bush today signed into law new rules for interrogating and putting suspected terrorists on trial. But can the new law itself pass the legal test?” (Oct. 17, 2006.) The legal test? Huh? Is that what they give in law school? No need to mention the White House or today in the lead-in as long as the correspondent went on to say both White House and today.

The way the anchor used today was not conversational. He put today before the verb. We don’t talk that way. We don’t say, “We today are going to a picnic.” Or “I tomorrow am going to the dentist.”

Makes you wonder: where was the editor? And how about the managing editor?

By MERVIN BLOCK
November 2006

Does this script make any sense—or am I just dense?

A network anchor said, “It will take place across the country tomorrow morning, and if you didn’t know it was coming, there’s no way you would know.”

If I didn’t know it was coming, I wouldn’t know what? Know that it was coming? Know that it had arrived? Know what it is?

That snippet from a script was broadcast recently by the anchor of NBC’s Nightly News, Brian Williams, who’s also the managing editor. I was told about the script by a television network producer in Australia, Matthew McGrane, who said he was baffled. I hadn’t seen that newscast, but I’ve confirmed the text–and the context—delivered by Williams:

“We are back this Monday night with NBC News In Depth, an American milestone. It will take place across this country tomorrow morning, and if you didn’t know it was coming, there’s no way you would know. It wasn’t all that long ago [delete all that], November 20th of [delete of] 1967, President Lyndon Johnson was giving a speech at the Commerce Department in Washington. The crowd started to applaud, noticing what was going on behind him. [Better: “The crowd noticed what was going on behind him—and began to applaud.”] The President turned around just as the huge digital counter above him, state of the art [cliché] at the time, cranked the estimated U-S population to 200-million. A lot of Americans thought we had grown just about as big as we ought to get, but, of course, we didn’t stop there. Well, tomorrow morning at 7:46 a.m., Eastern time, and don’t ask us how they estimate it, the U-S population will click over to 300-million….” (Nightly News, Oct. 16, 2006.)

The NBC script referred to 7:46 a.m.in the morning. A.M. is the abbreviation for ante meridiem, which means “before noon.” So a.m. in the morning, as journalism students are taught, is tautological. [Thanks to sharp-eyed reader Gil Haar for setting me straight on what A.M. stands for.]

An intelligible rewrite of the lead:

“The U-S population will reach an estimated 300-million tomorrow morning, and if you didn’t know that moment was coming, you wouldn’t realize it had passed.”

The next night, Williams said, “There is, as expected, news tonight about that American milestone that we were just at the cusp of when last we spoke last night. This morning, at 7:46 a.m., and again don’t ask us how anyone figures this out….” If there’s news, why not tell us what it is instead of taking the time to tell us there’s news when we already know we’re watching a newscast.

As expected is a news-appetite depressant. So is that clunky writing. And again, 7:46 a.m. in the morning.

How often is Nightly’s tonight not tonight? Almost nightly, it sometimes seems. Just the other night, on Oct. 31, Williams said, “We’ve learned tonight that after 50 years in the business, Bob Barker says he will retire this coming June….” We’ve learned tonight? They must be slow learners: The Associated Press moved a story about the retirement in mid-afternoon. It showed up at Nightly’s newsdesks at 3:39 p.m., EST, more than three hours before Williams said, “We’ve learned tonight.”

Another question occurs to me when I watch Nightly News: what does Williams mean when he introduces a story by saying “There’s word tonight”? Let’s examine one such story:

“There’s word tonight a notorious Utah polygamist who’s been on the run and the F-B-I’s list of America’s most wanted has now been captured.” (Aug. 29, 2006.) Sounds to me as though he’s suggesting the story broke that night. But more than eight hours before that newscast, at 10:17 a.m. EDT, The Associated Press reported the capture occurred the night before.

At best, there’s word tonight is ambiguous. Otherwise, you’d expect an anchor to say merely, “A notorious polygamist on the F-B-I’s list of most wanted has been captured.” (The polygamist was wanted, so there was no need to say he was on the run.) As for the phrase “There’s word tonight,” it’s past time to put it on a list of the most unwanted.

Another questionable Nightly script:

“As we first reported here last night, the book paints a picture of dysfunction and deception at the highest levels.” (Nightly News, Sept. 29, 2006.) First reported? That means reported first. But CNN reported the publication of Bob Woodward’s new book shortly before 4 p.m. the previous day. First reported could also be interpreted as the first time we reported it. But why would anyone use it in that sense?

Although the newscast is called Nightly News, it could easily be called Tonightly News. The word tonight is sprinkled throughout scripts liberally. On Nov. 1, 2006, Williams used tonight twice in one sentence—after using it in the preceding sentence. “And for more on where this daylong political saga stands as we speak tonight, we go to Tim Russert. Tonight finds our Washington bureau chief in Orlando, where he is moderating the Senate debate at the University of Central Florida tonight.” Yes, he began and ended the second sentence with tonight.

While we’re at it, let’s look at some other flawed excerpts from Nightly News:

“The North is threatening to do it again, blow off another nuclear weapon, if not several more.” (Nightly News, Oct. 17.) Blow off? Dictionaries say it means to ignore, or to outperform in a contest, or to end a relationship with, or to fail to attend. The writer probably meant blow up. Or set off. Or explode. Or detonate.

After the anchor’s lead-in, a correspondent said, “NBC News has been told by U-S officials that North Korea’s military has informed China it intends to explode not only one nuclear test but a series of underground nuclear tests.” A test isn’t exploded; a bomb is. Further, the use of not only requires but also.

“There’s health news to report tonight.” (Nov. 2, 2006.) So report it–without delay.

“But today the president assured them, they’ll be back there in just a few months’ time.” (Aug. 2, 2006.) A month is a measurement of time, so there’s no need for time.

More than 20 years ago, the then editor of Nightly News, Gilbert Millstein, put together a small styleguide, which pointed out a common error: starting a sentence with a singular subject and switching to an object that’s plural. But apparently not everyone is familiar with it:

“Ask a senior citizen in this country what organizations they belong to, and there’s a good chance they will mention A-A-R-P.” (March 2, 2005.) The singular citizen and the plural they? No way.

Another Nightly script: “There is a follow-up on our top story here [delete here] last night about the rapidly deflating [better: weakening] housing market. Last night we reported on that sharp drop in existing home sales. Well, today we learned [everything newscasters say on the air is something they’ve learned] new home sales also have dropped sharply, down four-point-three percent last month. That is the largest percentage drop since February. The inventory of unsold homes. sitting on the market across the country, also climbed to a new record high.” (Aug. 24, 2006.) Lead with the news; news is what’s new. New record is an old redundancy; if the inventory climbed to a new high, that is a record.

We’d better rewrite the script; using only facts found in the original, we’ll ditch there is–a dead phrase–and make it newsy:

“New home sales dropped sharply last month—down four-point-three percent. That’s the largest drop in five months. And the number of new homes on the market across the country rose to a record high. Sales of existing homes, reported yesterday, fell sharply.”

The original is 74 words; the rewrite is 41–shorter, sharper, stronger.

The previous evening, the anchor said, “The news today [isn’t today’s news what a newscast is all about?], sales of existing homes fell four-point-one percent in the month of July to their lowest level since January of 2004.” July is a month, so month is superfluous. Similarly, you wouldn’t say, “I’m going to paint my car the color purple.” You’d say “I’m going to paint my car purple”—and skip color. Also: do the math for the listener; instead of citing January 2004, it’s preferable to say the sales had fallen to their lowest point in two and a half years.

That script was broadcast August 23, so July was the previous month. In conversation—and broadcast writing should be conversational—we’d refer to July as “last month.”

Another departure from conversationality on Nightly:
“Now to the White House, where President Bush today signed into law new rules for interrogating and putting suspected terrorists on trial. But can the new law itself pass the legal test?” (Oct. 17, 2006.) The legal test? Huh? Is that what they give in law school? No need to mention the White House or today in the lead-in as long as the correspondent went on to say both White House and today.

The way the anchor used today was not conversational. He put today before the verb. We don’t talk that way. We don’t say, “We today are going to a picnic.” Or “I tomorrow am going to the dentist.”

Makes you wonder: where was the editor? And how about the managing editor?