Sentenced to Breadth

Congratulations are in order to Ralph Blumenthal, New York Times scribe, who says "aurvoir" to both punctuation and breathing with this opening line in today's paper:

The driver of the sealed truck that carried 19 illegal immigrants to grisly deaths nearly two years ago in South Texas in the nation's worst human smuggling disaster went on trial for his life here Tuesday with the government and the defense offering the jury sharply different pictures of his culpability.

Whoa, there, Ralphie! Looks like someone hasn't gotten their... period yet? Weighing in at 51 words, I am unofficially declaring this sentence as "The Poorest Sentence Ever Written." Maybe he didn't want to waste any Pulitzer blood on the topic, seeing as it has to do with immigrants and all.

Just in case you were wondering, the longest sentence ever written in world literature was done by, you guessed it, a Pole, in a novel called "Gates of Paradise."

Finally, I find it ironic that on the same page as an article about dead Mexican immigrants, there be a New York Times ad encouraging people to subscribe for "As Low as $2.90 a Week!", i.e. 5 times your average Mejicaners wages. Way to be sensitive, assholes.

Trial Starts in Nation's Deadliest Human Smuggling Case