Private language

More bad news for hed writers: You aren't the Red Queen. You don't get to unilaterally decide on new meanings for words and expect your poor reading public to understand what you're talking about. Today's case in point, from the metro front of one of the leading local dailies:

Mackinac
gala gets
top GOP
runners

The hed is trying to reflect the second graf's "All of the major GOP candidates" (putting news into the lede simply isn't done anymore, one gathers), and it does so by shortening "candidates" to "runners." Unfortunate, because that isn't any of the scores of things that "runner" means. A candidate in front can be a "front-runner," and a candidate finishing out of the money can be an "also-ran," but a candidate isn't a "runner." The hed writer is indulging in some sort of private Secret Language and hoping readers will catch on. Given the number of meanings of "runner" available to readers, that doesn't seem a very good bet.

Now. HEADSUP-L is specifically not at home to bizarre arguments on the order of "Don't tell me 'pled' is now becoming an actual word (and turn that music down right now before you destroy the language of Shakespeare)." Of course "pled" is a word. It's a legitimate past tense of "plead," and if Shakespeare didn't use it, Spenser did. It's not the preferred form in U.S. news language, but proclaiming that it isn't a word is the sort of argument that makes copyeds look both tin-eared and technically inept. "Runner" is a word too. It just isn't a word that means "candidate."

Solution? Heh heh. There's plenty of room on that line for "hopefuls." You don't have to like it, but "candidate for a position" is a well-established meaning for "hopeful" in the language of Shakespeare's island descendents. And, as with "runner," you can look it up.