Whatever…

The New York Times, bastion of all the news that’s fit to print, and then some, opened a recent story with the sentence “Whatever happened to Ron Paul?”  Somewhere on the staff of that august publication there must be editors who know better. 

In that sentence, as in the classic movie What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, what  and ever should be two words.  What is an interrogative pronoun, requesting information about “the identity, nature, or value of an object or condition,” and ever is an adverbial modifier meaning “over a period of time.”

The same paper in another story indicated that Mitt Romney will do “whatever it takes” to win the Republican nomination.  Maybe so, but at least this time they got whatever right. In this case it is properly one word, a pronoun meaning “anything,” “everything,”  “no matter what,” or “other similar things.” For example: Whatever I say, you tell me to “shut up” or I enjoy Chardonnay, bock beer, single-malt whiskey, or whatever.

The one-word whatever can also be an adjective, meaning “of any kind” or an adverb meaning “in any case.”  For example: I’ll take whatever money you have or There is no point whatever in your resisting because I have a gun.

Contemporary usage of the one-word whatever, following a question and usually accompanied by a rolling of the eyes and/or a shrug of the shoulders, is adverbial in this sense, with an added connotation of “why are you bothering me with this?”

What ever became of the Bard of Buffalo Bayou?  Whatever.

            Mitt Romney on the Campaign Trail

           

            I’m not concerned about the poor,

            They have a safety net.           

            Ten thousand dollars says that you’re

            Not going to take my bet.

           

            I really like it when I’m able

            To fire the people who

            Repair my cars, install my cable,

            Or give me a shampoo.

            You’re out of work? Now, listen—shucks,

            I, too, am unemployed.

            Of course, two hundred million bucks

            Does help to fill the void.

           

            My income taxes cause me pains—

            Almost fifteen percent!

            I try to save my capital gains

            (But some of them I spent).

            I do get speakers’ fees and such

            At places I appear,

            But they don’t amount to much—

            Just half–a-mill last year.

           

            Corporations?  They are people,

            Just like me and you.

            Just wait—that Democratic Veep’ll

            Claim that isn’t true.

           

            My love of sports goes to extremes,

            I love to cheer and yell,

            I follow almost all the teams

            And know their owners well.

            How often do I wish again,

            That I could catch a flight

            To see those trees in Michigan—

            They’re just the perfect height.

            Home ownership? We need much more

            To make our nation thrive,

            Why, I myself own three or four—

            Or possibly it’s five.

           

            Obamacare’s abomination,

            I really do abhor it,

            With just one tiny reservation:

            In my state I was for it.

            For the price of gas we owe great thanks

            To Democrats who tax:

            It makes it hard to fill the tanks

            Of all my Cadillacs.

            On my lawn crew, I told their foreman,

            Hire no illegal alien.

            After all, I am a Mormon—

            And not Episcopalian.

            They say I’m like an Etch-a-Sketch,

            But, heck, that’s just plain nutty,

            When there’s a fact I have to stretch,

            I’m more like Silly Putty.

            As for that dog, atop my car

            To Canada—I swear,

            It really wasn’t all that far,

            And the dog just loves fresh air.

           

            You won’t find more, if you should delve

            Much deeper into Romney.

            Just vote for me in 2012,

            And I mean Anno Domini.    
    
   

Bah, humbug, everyone!

If Thanksgiving comes, can Christmas be far behind? In a New York Times review of the new movie A Christmas Carol, A. O. Scott commends the producers for retaining “much of the flavor of Dickens’s prose—not just the catchphrases like ‘Bah, humbug’ and ‘God bless us everyone,’ but also the formal diction and the moral concern.”  Well, okay, but to retain the flavor of Dickens’ catchphrases, you ought to catch ‘em the way he threw ‘em.

Ebenezer Scrooge never says “Bah, humbug”—run together, as Mr. Scott writes it, in a single utterance with only a comma between the two words.  Scrooge says “Bah!” (an interjection expressing contempt) only twice in the tale and both times it is followed not by a comma, but by an exclamation point, making it a complete and emphatic statement. “Humbug!” (a fraud or a hoax) follows, in both instances, as a separate statement with its own terminal punctuation.

A trivial point, I hear you say.  Bah!  Humbug!  What is punctuation, after all, but a few needless squiggles? WellIllsaymaybeyourerightbutmaybeyouarent.

Of more consequence is Mr. Scott’s parsing of “God bless us everyone.” What the absurdly cheerful Tiny Tim actually shrieks is “God bless us every one!”  I’m not so concerned about Mr. Scott’s omission of the exclamation point in this case—although its lack does give Tim’s outburst a curiously muted feeling for so festive an occasion—but more so about the running together of the two words every and one.  What Tim says, and what he undoubtedly means, is that he hopes that God will bless “us”—i.e. the Cratchit family—“every one,” that is each member of the family, without exception.  The use of the pronoun everyone, which means “all people,” goes far beyond the familial intent of Tim, whose exuberant benison follows the consumption of a slug of gin with lemon juice (what Dickens calls “hot stuff”).  No wonder he is so exuberant. 

The Bard of Buffalo Bayou, not so fortunate as to be in the gin-infused state of euphoria that motivated Tiny Tim, threw a lump of coal on the fire, dipped his quill into the inkpot, and scratched out these sober words for the season:

    For all the joys of Christmas,
    We offer thanks galore
    To Charles John Huffam Dickens
    (And also Clement Moore).