Daily Dose of Pedantry

We apologize, but it's time for another mini-treatise on grammar and style.  Those of you who roll their eyes at this particular branch of solipsism can check back tomorrow when we might have something to say about Froot Loops or Silly Putty.

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You may have heard people complain about "mixed metaphors."  These may have been starchy English professor-types garbed in tweed, who also have a thing about split infinitives and preposition-ended propositions.  But when it comes to mixed metaphors, they have a (small) point.

Mixed metaphors are hardly mortal sins, but there is something ungainly about them.  Consider the following sentences:

The Bush Express went off the rails shortly after 9/11.

Or:

During the Bush Administration, the ship of state hit several anti-constitutional icebergs and nearly went down.

Now, ignoring for the moment that we are trafficking (pun intended) in cliche, we can say that those two sentences "work."  On the other hand, were we to say,

During the Bush Administration, the ship of state went off the rails.

we would be "wrong."  That sentence strikes us improper, incorrect, ugly.  The reason: a mixed metaphor.  If the state is a "ship," what is it doing on "rails" in the first place?  A picayune quibble?  Perhaps.  But a little more attention to detail is the mark of the true writer.

All of this occurred to us today when we read the following decidedly unmixed metaphor in today's Times ("Roberts Court Shifts Right, Tipped by Kennedy"): 

"Chief Justice Roberts has certainly been planting seeds in this term's decisions.  If his reasoning takes root in future cases, the law will move in a conservative direction. . . . "

See it?  SEEDS take ROOT.  And (to extend the metaphor) jurisprudence may BRANCH off in a whole new direction.

Too bad those branches are all on the right, but that's a different concern.

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But as The Solipsist gives to the Times with one hand, he must take from it with the other:

"One of the [insurance] plans capped reimbursement for an operation at $5,000, for example, although many procedures cost at least several times that amount" ("Insured, but Bankrupted by Health Crises", emphasis added).

Now, "at least" can modify amounts, indicating that the amount stated is a minimum: Write an essay of AT LEAST 500 words; AT LEAST 2/3 of the members of the Senate must vote to remove an impeached president from office; there are AT LEAST 19,000 calories in the average Twinkie, etc.  The key is that the amount must be an actual quantity.  You cannot have "at least several" something!  Would you then have "at most" a lot?

So "Cheers!" to Adam Liptak, the stylish Supreme Court reporter.  But "Jeers!" to the sloppy Reed Abelson (or his editor) for a rhetorical boo-boo.

(Image from zazzle.com)