Here’s my critique of the newspaper story passages that you have posted on My Media English Watch:
FIRST PARAGRAPH
MANILA, Philippines—Sen. Panfilo Lacson was not only the “best crime writer” but also a wiretapper and killer, Senate President Pro Tempore Jinggoy Estrada Wednesday said in a privilege speech aimed at countering the charges Lacson had hurled against him and his father.
In the interest of parallel structure I believe the first sentence should read "but also a wiretapper and a killer"…
My opinion on this usage:
Using an article or not for all the items in an enumerative sequence is actually a matter of choice, so both “a wiretapper and killer” and “a wiretapper and a killer” are both correct and parallel forms in this case.
What’s important for achieving parallel structure is consistency. In an enumerative sequence with three or more items, in particular, it’s either we use an article only once for the first item or we use an article for each and every item in the sequence.
Parallel using an article only for the first item: “She was a loner, insomniac, and procrastinator.”
Parallel using an article for each item: “She was a loner, an insomniac, and a procrastinator.”
SECOND PARAGRAPH
Jinggoy Wednesday cited the Kuratong Baleleng rubout and other cases involving Lacson when he was a police official in an attempt to portray the latter as the real bad guy and not him and his father, former President Joseph Estrada.
I believe the clause "when he was a police official" should be enclosed in parenthesis or double hyphen. Moreover, I think the preposition "he" should have been used instead of "him" so it would read "...the real bad guy and not he and his father.."
My opinion on this usage:
No, I don’t think the phrase “when he was a police official” should be enclosed in parenthesis or set off by a double hyphen; that would make the phrase a parenthetical and I don’t think that was the intention of the writer.
In the phrase “not him and his father,” the use of “he”—it’s a pronoun, not a preposition, by the way—is actually correct. This is because it’s actually the direct object of the verb “portray” and should be in the objective form “him” instead of the subjective form “he.”
I think a more serious problem with that sentence is the bad placement of the long prepositional phrase “official in an attempt to portray the latter as the real bad guy and not him and his father, former President Joseph Estrada.” It seems to me almost a misplaced modifier in the sense that it doesn’t correlate well with what is being cited by the subject of the sentence; instead, it seems to correlate more strongly with the noun phrase “police official.”
One way to clarify that sentence is to put that prepositional phrase up front of the sentence:
“In an attempt to portray the latter as the real bad guy and not him and his father (former President Joseph Estrada), Jinggoy Wednesday cited the Kuratong Baleleng rubout and other cases involving Lacson when he was a police official.”
Another way is to spin off that troublesome prepositional phrase into a separate sentence:
“Jinggoy Wednesday cited the Kuratong Baleleng rubout and other cases involving Lacson when he was a police official. This was in an attempt to portray the latter as the real bad guy and not him and his father, former President Joseph Estrada.”
FOURTH PARAGRAPH
Saying this would be his “last” privilege speech on the matter and refusing again to address Lacson as a senator,
Again, in the interest of parallel structure the first sentence should have been written this way--"Saying this would be his 'last' privilege speech on the matter and would refuse to address Lacson as a senator again,"
My opinion on this usage:
No, I don’t so. The sentence is parallel in structure as it is, with “saying this” and “refusing again” both in the progressive “-ing” form of the verb. Your proposed construction is grammatically incorrect because it doesn’t recognize the fact that the sentence is actually an elided version of the following sentence with two “that clauses”:
"Saying that this would be his 'last' privilege speech on the matter and that he would refuse to address Lacson as a senator again,"
If we insert those “that’s” in your proposed reconstruction and make some grammatical refinements, the sentence would become structurally correct:
"Saying that this would be his 'last' privilege speech on the matter and that he would not address Lacson as a senator ever again,"
FIRST SUB TITLE
‘Jueteng’ payola
Lacson also related a conversation between a son of a President asking a “jueteng” operator to give the share of his brother’s cut in the illegal number game to him lest the latter use it to buy drugs.
Note the inconsistent use of quotation marks on the word jueteng.
The sentence is weak because a news writer has to be exact in making references. The clause "a son of a President is weak" and is a sign of poor writing. If these were the exact words used by Lacson then it should be enclosed in quotation marks.
Also, the word "between" should have been replaced with the word "where" and then the verb "was" should have been added after the word "President".
The sentence should have been written as follows:
Lacson also related a conversation where "a son of a President" was asking a "jueteng" operator to give..
My opinion on your comments on original sentence in question:
(1) Newspapers follow their own stylebook on the matter of using quotation marks. That particular newspaper obviously uses single quotes for uncommon terms or terms in a language other than English, and double quotes for those terms in the main body of news stories. So long as they are applied consistently, we can’t fault this particular newspaper for its own stylistic choices.
(2) I agree with you that it would have been much better grammatically and stylistically if the writer of that story treated the noun phrase “a son of a President” as an orphan quote*. This would have been more reflective of the intent of the speaker to avoid making a definite identification of the person referred to.
(3) You’re right about this sentence: “Lacson also related a conversation between a son of a President asking a ‘jueteng’ operator to give the share of his brother’s cut in the illegal number game to him lest the latter use it to buy drugs.”
As you suggest, the word "between" should have been replaced with the word "where" and then the verb "was" should have been added after the word "President." The sentence definitely reads much better that way:
“Lacson also related a conversation where a son of a President was asking a ‘jueteng’ operator to give the share of his brother’s cut in the illegal number game to him lest the latter use it to buy drugs.”
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*Orphan quotes or “drop-in quotes” usually consist of just one or a few words that the writer decides to enclose within quotation marks to convey a shade of meaning that only the writer knows and that readers could very well miss. They are sometimes meant to make the reader think that the writer actually means something other than what is actually being said.
