The Captain’s Log

Pontifications of The Great and Terrible Captain Cucamunga.

Wed, 24 Jul 2024 12:30:30 EDT

Consider This Sentence

The following sentence appears in The Washington Post on Apple News. “Weeks of pent-up Democratic panic gave way to a historic flood of campaign cash for likely presidential nominee Vice President Harris this week, as allied groups reported massive fundraising hauls amid donor elation.”

The sentence wants to split into two. Historic has an unstressed first syllable, so let’s convert the preceding a to an an. Let’s replace likely with presumtive because it flows better. Let’s name Kamala Harris in full because it flows better. This week is too far away from the verb the phrase modifies. Let’s fix that. Allied groups is surprising on first encounter. Let’s replace it.

My rewrite: “Weeks of pent-up Democratic panic gave way this week to an historic flood of campaign cash for presumptive presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris. Fundraising entities have reported massive hauls amid donor elation.”