I don’t generally like to get into grammar wars – after all, in this business, there’s generally someone willing to send me an email every time I commit a sin against the English language and I’ll probably still screw something up in this post – but gosh, it feels like someone should have caught the fewer/less error in one of the hundred or so (seemingly) Martha McSally ads running right now.

In the ad titled “Time” (above), the narrator kicks into a general list of complaints Southern Arizonans might have with Congress…a lack of border security, sad senior citizens and this:

mcsally_less_jobs.jpg

Certainly, the argument should probably be about the veracity of McSally’s claims (and next week’s cover story by Jim Nintzel does a great job of looking into McSally’s plans to fix Washington and America), but every time I’ve seen and heard the ad, I block out everything following the error, which might as well be a cymbal crash adjacent to my ear.

As mistakes go, this is a common one, mostly because the meanings of the words are the same, but their usage is different. From the New York Times‘ After Deadline blog:

The basic rule for precise use of “less” and “fewer” is simple (though we slip often). Use “fewer” with countable, individual things, and “less” with uncountable amounts, volumes, etc. So: “I should drink less coffee,” but “I should eat fewer doughnuts.”

But it’s not as simple as plural (fewer) vs. singular (less). Sometimes “less” is correct even with a plural noun. The Times’s stylebook says this:

Also use less with a number that describes a quantity considered as a single bulk amount: The police recovered less than $1,500; It happened less than five years ago; The recipe calls for less than two cups of sugar.

So, yes, “less” can be correct with a plural noun, but since the number of jobs lost (sigh) can be counted and isn’t a singular, bulk item, fewer should be correct.

These things happen, but how did this ad slip past the dozens of people who must have watched this ad before it was sent off to seemingly every network and cable channel? Didn’t someone say “Wait, ‘less jobs’ just doesn’t sound quite right…maybe we should check into that”?

Again, I realize this opens me up to a distinct amount of criticism regarding my own use of words, but hey, if you’re spending a ton of money to run ads, it might be wise to double-check the language used on them.

This article appears in Sep 11-17, 2014.

The editor of the Tucson Weekly. I have no idea how I got here.

25 replies on “McSally Ad Demonstrates the Challenge of Fewer vs. Less”

  3. Regardless of the camouflage, the real story is there are fewer jobs than Obama/Barber promised. Many fewer. Minimum wage pushes upward and the rich get richer but Democrats have somehow forgotten the middle class.

    Except when they formulate tax increase plans.

  5. In the same ad, you must have also noticed the adjective/adverb mistake “choose different” instead of the correct choose differently.

  6. There is one candidate for the TUSD board holding a Ph.D. who apparently does not understand the difference between “loose – my pants feel loose” and “lose -it would be a shame to lose your iPhone.” Another candidate uses idiosyncratic and bizarre capitalization in published comments . Neither is running as a Republican.

    As with McSally, I don’t mind and won’t be voting on the basis of their mastery of grammar and spelling. If you nitpick each candidate’s misuse of grammar, you could “loose” your mind – and Dear Reader’s confidence.

  8. I also cringe at phrasing of “We can choose different” (:09). Unless the ad is saying “We can choose (something) different,” I believe it should say “We can choose differently.”

  10. Martha continues to brag about not wearing muslim clothing while she was in the gulf war little realizing that the order was given, at that time, to show respect for the customs in the Arab world where we were fighting. Yes, bad word usage makes me cringe as well. I am wondering, though, where Martha has been living and working since the last election. Arizona? Out of state like before? Employed as a candidate by her corporate backers? She claims to be watching out for seniors, but, when I spoke to her before her last election with a concern about plans to privatize medicare and social security (an excuse for someone ELSE to take part of the money needed for our benefits) she answered, “What do you care since you can opt for the current plan.” Why would I NOT care for others as well as for myself?

  11. I love the ads that Sally is supported by billionairs that contribute $14,000 to her campaign. While ex mayor ballonberg spends millions on anti- gun ads for Barber.

  16. Obviously you are a left wing communist heathen supporter of Barber and want to diminish the candidacy of a fine Christian pro-American patriot.

  17. Owner class is beholding to who is in office???
    They clearly have changed the kool-aid formula to something much stronger

  18. Well at the very least, Barber can spell correctly. Just can’t do much else but vote along with Obama’s crap and all of the other Kool Aid drinking liberals.

  19. This faux pas clearly demonstrates ignorance of grammar. I have to wonder, why is there no staff member, working for the advertising company or McSally’s campaign, whose job it is to catch such things?

  20. Its the weakly folks, they only notice mistakes by anyone but themselves and the leftists. They have too, because their message makes no sense.

  22. Show us a comparable mistake in any other political ad being run in the Tucson area. The grammatical error was unprofessional. I have no doubt that there are Republicans who cringe about it in secret. Martha McSally should have sent the ad back and told them to make corrections. But she approved the message and ended up with ownership of the error. Note, this was a grammatical error, not a spelling mistake.

  23. from factchecker

    “Really, we should be afraid of this court. The five guys who start determining what contraceptions are legal. Let’s not even go there.”

    — Pelosi

    This is a very odd statement from the House Democratic leader, given that the majority opinion flatly states that “under our cases, women (and men) have a constitutional right to obtain contraceptives,” citing the 1965 ruling in Griswold v. Connecticut, which under the right to privacy nullified a law prohibiting the use of contraceptives.

    That one didn’t bother anybody and it was the SOTH that said it.

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