I’m a compulsive nitpicker when it comes to accuracy in the written or spoken word; I have a keen eye and ear for errors in spelling, punctuation, grammar, syntax and even semantics. It’s a pretty thankless preoccupation; I’m routinely called “the grammar police” and worse. And I must admit that lately, with the world almost literally on fire, allusions to my nitpickery being tantamount to the futility of “re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic” are lent validity.

But I still find it vexing to see and hear examples of what I consider a pandemic of quasi-literacy, such as people who don’t know “than” from “then,” or “lose” from “loose,” or who use “loan” as a verb (when it should be “lend”), or who say “the reason is because...” And don’t get me started on writers who don’t know “hippie” from

“hippy” or “doggie” from “doggy” (in both cases, the former is a noun while the latter is an adjective), or who somehow think that apostrophes are necessary for pluralization.

And so, among the many public remarks on the passing of former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, one of the most frequently quoted (it seemed to appear in every newscast in the 24 hours following her death) is particularly irksome. And I’m not talking about how so much of the reporting on her death manages to omit that she was appointed (in 1981) by Pres. Ronald Reagan; that’s another matter altogether, and is a product of the political agenda that permeates and drives the Mainstream Media, rather than ignorance of proper English. Most of the coverage of her death also omits identifying her as a Conservative.

Image: Sandra Day O’Connor blazing a new trail by Andrea Widburg, using AI.

What I am talking about are the remarks of Rep. Greg Stanton, a Democrat from Arizona. He said of Justice O’Connor, “She blazed every trail she set foot on.” And No, my issue is not with Rep. Stanton having ended a sentence with a preposition. Rather, I heard this and it immediately evoked Inigo Montoya’s line from “The Princess Bride”: “I do not think [that word] means what you think it means.”

One cannot blaze a trail one has set foot on, because to blaze a trail is to create a path or route where none existed.

This is certainly not meant to disparage Justice O’Connor, nor to trivialize her accomplishments. As the first woman to serve on the SCOTUS, she was most certainly a trailblazer. So my issue is not with that characterization, but with Rep. Stanton’s unlettered non sequitur, which, it seems, I may be the only one to have noticed.

Stu Tarlowe, a septuagenarian, is a native of NYC who has, for many years now, made his home in Kansas. He has, since 2010, contributed well over 150 pieces to American Thinker. His personal pantheon of heroes and role models includes Barry Farber, Jean Shepherd, Long John Nebel, Bob Grant, Aristide Bruant, William Safire, Col. Jeff Cooper, Rabbi Meir Kahane, G. Gordon Liddy, Hunter S. Thompson, Emmett Grogan, Theo Kojak, Paladin and Rin Tin Tin.