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Scathing Online Schoolmarm Says: Here’s a great example of a …

non sequitur:

Police Chief Nate King says a fight at a nightclub at 100 East Downing Street attracted dozens of people and ended in gunshots and a stabbing. He says two people were shot and one was stabbed.

King says one of the shooting victims was an NSU football player.

The police chief said officers originally arrested two people, 30-year-old Damon Glass, AKA, Damon Shade, for accessory to assault with a deadly weapon, and 23-year-old Robbie Foreman for two counts of assault and battery with a deadly weapon, possession of a firearm and possession of a firearm while intoxicated.

Friday night, however, the chief said Foreman confessed to the stabbing and shooting. He also said Glass was no longer in custody.

There’s a quaintness about downtown Tahlequah, with its many storefronts offering unique shopping.

Margaret Soltan, August 22, 2015 8:22AM
Posted in: Scathing Online Schoolmarm

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3 Responses to “Scathing Online Schoolmarm Says: Here’s a great example of a …”

  1. adam Says:

    Orphan text?

  2. Dr_Doctorstein Says:

    Yeah, at first I also thought there might be a block of text missing — a common enough error since the onset of cut-and-paste editing — but now I think it’s just a clumsy attempt at a transition (from the fact that there was a shooting to the idea that violent crimes are unusual in that part of town, which has a “quaintness….” etc).

    Offered as it is without attribution, the “quaintness” bit is editorializing. It could be cut entirely, since the quote from Millican — “This is a nice, little town” (I’d have cut the comma) — makes the point sufficiently.

    After watching the video, I have a better idea of what’s happened: the written version of the story is incorrectly using conventions from TV journalism. The transition and editorializing that seem so jarring in print are acceptable on TV, which has less formal standards generally and where the visuals help viewers make sense of transitions.

    Also in need of correction is the tense shift, from “says” (which on TV conveys a sense of immediacy) to “said” (standard in print).

    Sorry for the disquisition. I guess I miss my old jobs as newspaper editor and college newspaper adviser. I’ve worked with plenty of aspiring journalists writing at the level of Tess Maune. She’s almost where she ought to be, but still needs some mentoring.

  3. Margaret Soltan Says:

    Dr_ — All true. I’d add that the images provided of the town make clear that it’s anything but quaint and attractive. It looks very grim, very stark. Which makes the editorializing that much more bizarre.

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