Much to Do about the Taxonomy of Presidential Modifiers
National Public Radio’s news program “All Things Considered” reads letters from listeners about recent stories:
Correspondent 1: All five of our conservative listeners objected to our description of President Bush as a “pointy head dodo bird” in a report last week about the new Bush presidency countdown clock in Times Square. Listener Frank Von Swat in Boise, Idaho wrote: “I won’t quarrel with your quaint use of the dodo bird calumny, but to say that the president has a pointed head is to deny the obvious. You radio people are so isolated within the confines of your antiquated medium. Have you bothered to look at a photograph of the president lately? Try it. You won’t see a pointed head.”
Correspondent 2: We were dismayed that we managed to outrage our entire conservative listener base with a single report about President Bush. So we conducted an investigation. Turns out, it was all an administrative error. After the Bush Dodo Bird report was completed, it should have been sent to our Political Taxonomy department for review. Instead, it was sent to our Taxidermy department. The taxidermists reviewed the report and found no problem, so it was broadcast.
Correspondent 1: We were equally dismayed to receive several letters from our more liberal listeners who took us to task about calling the president a “pointy head dodo bird”. They objected to our use of the term “pointy head” and pointed out that the correct usage would be “pointy-headed”.
Correspondent 2: Listener Irma Francesca in Purdue, Indiana summed up this criticism when she wrote to say: “I have devoted my life to studying dodo taxonomy and I can assure you that there was never a pointy head branch of the dodo family. Thus, your use of “pointy head” to modify “dodo” within the context of describing President Bush was incorrect. What you should have used was “pointy-headed” with a hyphen separating “pointy” and “headed”. That would have made it clear that you were using “pointy-headed” to modify “Bush” and not “dodo bird”.
Correspondent 1: NPR regrets the entire Bush dodo affair. We have made detailed notes on on the matter and placed them in our President Bush file. Should we ever prepare another report on President Bush, we will make every effort to see that the producer in charge doesn’t link the President with the dodo bird.
Correspondent 2:: We want to hear from you. Call our listener response telephone number or send us your e-mails. Be sure to tell us how to pronounce your name, unless your name is Jones or Smith, which we know how to pronounce. However, if your name is Smith but the “i” is long and your name is really pronounced as “Sm-i-i-i-th’, please tell us that. Sorry, our producers don’t allow us to pronounce double last names.