Literasey r us

I’m so old, I remember when reporters, even those at the NY Post, understood basic English idioms or, if they didn’t, had editors who did, and would spot and correct them. That day is past.

This article that caught my eye this morning:

Category 5 storm about to clobber Jamaica

Here’s the lead in — so far, so good:

“A Category 5 behemoth, Melissa is poised to crash head-on into Jamaica by Tuesday morning — the first storm of its size to make landfall on the island since hurricanes began being recorded in 1850, Fox Weather told The Post.

But then, uh-oh:

And it pales in comparison to the strongest storm to hit Jamaica — Hurricane Gilbert, a Category 3 that made landfall in 1988 — which damaged or destroyed at least a fifth of the island’s buildings at a cost of $2.5 billion and killed 45 people.”

No, honey, you’ve got that exactly backwards, thereby turning a declarative sentence into gibberish. I realize it doesn’t speak well of me that I should find myself annoyed by such a petty thing so early in the morning, but to quote the vegetable, “C’mon, man”.