Journalists ripe with line-towing

Yes, it's time for another break from candidate-bashing to have a go at usage mistakes by journalists and writers who should know better.  This is mostly for fun, and I hope you'll take it that way.  But I have to say it DOES vex me a little…

Here are tonight's four more-or-less-random selections:

jive vs. jibe

The Toronto Star, in a discussion about climate data:

The idea that less sunshine was reaching the Earth's surface – which should result in cooling – simply didn't jive.

Of course it didn't jive.  It couldn't.  Unless it was shucking as well.  

The Scranton Times-Tribune, though, gets it right:

But it didn’t jibe with the state attorney general, whose spokesman dubbed the deal “anti-competitive.”

ripe vs. rife

Not sure how the substance-abuse theme took hold here, but let's start with the Cincinnati Enquirer:

Indiana is ripe with marijuana plants, especially in the northern part of the state, where it grows wild from the days when the plants were harvested for hemp.

And who corrects them?  The Standard (Kenya):

The district is rife with tales of men who have come to ruin owing to alcoholism.

gel vs. jell

Here's a particularly clear example of one journalist who can transcribe, and another who cannot.  The B-52's gave a quote to Canadian newspapers; the Winnipeg Sun screws it up…

And we got together and things just didn't gel, because it takes all four of us to do it, and maybe the stars weren't in alignment or something.

…while the Barrie Examiner nails it:

And we got together and things just didn't jell, because it takes all four of us to do it, and maybe the stars weren't in alignment or something.

And one more that gets me:

tow the line vs. toe the line

Here Howard Cohen of McClatchy Newspapers misquotes country star Trace Adkins:

I don't tow the line for anybody - not for the Republicans or for the NRA and I'm a member and I'm a Republican because I don't have anywhere else to go.

But the Monterey Herald horoscope section, of all places, does it right:

For now, toe the line. Tonight: Lighten up the mood.

Yes, you put your toes to the line, as if strictly obeying a command, but you don't haul some rope with a pickup truck.  Who would ask you to do that anyway?  Well, maybe the Republicans.