Some thoughts over sloppy reportage

We used to keep a foam-rubber brick for hurling at at the telly, but it disappeared in a house move. I miss it (the brick, not the telly - I was a very good shot). I've given up waiting for the hypothetical, though perfectly possible 'US troops evacuated over Iraq' because there's now a more insidious assault on the English language than the all-purpose preposition 'over' - and that is the prevalence of the dramatic present (aka historic present) in news reports, usually at tea-time when innocent children might be watching. Newspaper headlines use the historic present for two good reasons - it has impact and immediacy, and it takes less space, 's' being shorter than 'ed'. But once the headline is out of the way, newspaper reporting reverts to a more conventional linguistic treatment of past, present and future.

Not telly reporting, though. Tense abuse is widespread, often with ludicrous consequences when desperate newsreaders try to cope with the tripe the work-experience kids who write the reports churn out, lacking any familiarity with the pluperfect or anything else much, innit. Tense shifting simply doesn't work in TV reportage. "Police are now searching the area. Later, a spokesperson said..." It's nonsense.. It's Doctor Who territory. 

Just two quotes:

"If you introduce things which are past as present and now taking place, you will make your story no longer a narration but an actuality."
(Longinus, On the Sublime. Out of print, publisher unknown, authorship uncertain, but probably 1st or 3rdC AD)

"Avoid the use of the historical present unless the narrative is sufficiently vivid to make the use spontaneous. The historical present is one of the boldest of figures and, as is the case with all figures, its overuse makes a style cheap and ridiculous."
(James Finch Royster and Stith Thompson, Guide to Composition. Scott, Foresman, 1919)

Rant over (oh bugrit, I've used that word)