Saturday, October 24, 2009

Tch, tch. It's "principal"!

Money management guru Dave Ramsey blew it today in his syndicated column entitled "Make payment visits personal."

Anyone else read it? Catch the error?

In his answer to "Scotty", Dave wrote (about making extra payments on a mortgage or car loan) that you should indicate clearly on your separate check "principle only". And then he used the word "principle" two more times, for a total of three, when what he meant was "principal."

I learned a long time ago (in grade school? junior high school?) that you use principal when you are referring to money and principle when you are referring to a rule. Easy to remember ... principle/rule.

Sorry, Dave. It wasn't just a typo.

6 comments:

Unknown said...

Here you go again Gus, you are the perfect one. Perfect grammar, perfect driving, and you just might be the perfect sheriff, NOT!!! You just wish the world could be just as good as you........
You are so harsh about a grammatical error, but when you get a ticket for a broken headlight you want it to slide. Keep showing your idiocracy!

Dave Labuz said...

Ace, chill. Gus makes a valid point. Turn of the century 8-year-olds had better spelling, diction, grammar and vocabulary than most adults today. While that is currently viewed by you and others as “acceptable”, it is not when you are out there as an “educated” person on particular subjects or as a journalist. The printed word is how others judge you. Speech is our most important and guaranteed Right – particularly if it’s your job. The typos I find on a daily basis in all of our area newspapers is alarming and just plain sad.

Capital and Capitol, for instance. The first we create, which the second confiscates.

Weather and Whether. In the second, we wonder about the state of the first.

Their, there and they’re – so there! LOL! Good lord, and then there is apostrophe diarrhea as well.

Words mean things.

On the other hand Gus, I have seen apologies offered by various columnists in the past for poorly typed transcriptions of which they innocent of. Perhaps this will be one of those cases.

And to think that I can’t get a job in a newsroom because I don’t have a degree in Journalism! LOL! They paid HOW MUCH for their degree? Madness…..

DBTR

FatParalegal said...

How do you explain the "principal" meaning "head of school" spelling? I do realize that we taxpayers are being fleeced by the school districts / teachers' unions, etc., but I do not think that is why it is spelled as such for the definition I mentioned.

Gus said...

When I was living in Santa Fe in about 1991, the local paper advertised for a proofreader for its classified.

I circled all the misspelled words in the ads and submitted that as my application. I guess they didn't have a sense of humor, because they didn't call me for an interview.

Dave Labuz said...

!!!!!

I did the very same thing, same results! LOL!

Had we made it through, we'd probably be asked what kind of tree we'd like to be and what our favoite color is.

Karen30036 said...

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The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.



Azanmig hhu? Yaeh, and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!