Your experience indicates that they already have several.
I think I must have tugged at Janet’s heartstrings when she asked me who I was. I said, “I’m just nobody. A citizen.” Bless her heart, she said, “A citizen isn’t nobody. That’s who we’re here to serve. What’s your question? I’ll get you an answer.” Honest to God, it sounds hokey as hell, but that’s what transpired, and I’m just on Cloud Nine because of it. Nice to know there do exist good and caring servants of the people after all.
Whoo-hoo!
Yo, that’s right! You nailed it to the tee. Well done, sir! […salute…]
Thread retitled at request of OP.
Gfactor
General Questions Moderator
Maybe I’m misreading you, but this seems to assume that the press has some obligation or responsibility to use “formal” titles, which they absolutely don’t and shouldn’t.
In fact, I think the press uses “formal” titles far too often, as in “John Doe, president and CEO of Big Corp.” or “Jane Doe, executive vice president and general counsel of Big Corp.” President and CEO? Executive vice president and general counsel? This is all just corporate bullshit and contains no useful information for the reader.
I’m with you on this one.
Perhaps it doesn’t give useful information to you, but to anyone in the business world this is hugely important information. It makes a vast different whether one person holds both the titles of CEO and president. e.g., or not. I’d fire any reporter who didn’t get and put into the story information this important and this basic.
Could she (Janet) be convinced to throw her hat into the ring? 
Now, is Bill himself the one that chooses to go by Bill instead of William for a formal announcement like that?
Those aren’t formal titles. No press article I’ve ever seen would say, “John Doe, president of Big Corp, went to dinner last night. President Doe ordered the veal.” That’s wrong. They’d say, “John Doe, president of Big Corp, went to dinner last night. Mr. Doe ordered the veal.” Which is just fine by me.
I’m referring to things like news stories calling State Senator Joe Blow, “Senator Blow.” He’s formally called Mr. Blow.
His choice. Lately he has been formalizing his name a lot more than he used to. But he used to sign bills with “Bill Clinton” much as President Carter used to sign “Jimmy Carter”.
I think it’s either a Democratic or southern affectation, but I’ve always found it strange.
If you’re editing for a specialty publication and the story somehow implicates the distinction between “president” and “CEO,” then fine.
In general news and business stories, I just can’t see how it would be relevant. In fact, in the types of stories I write, in which such corporate officers are commenting on legislation or the development of legal doctrine, my preference is to drop the specific office altogether and go with “John Doe of Big Corp.” and, in fact, I think for most general audience news stories it’s rare that anything more specific is needed.
I’ve always heard that the proper way to address a former president would be by their highest position not in the US executive branch. Therefore I would say President and Governor Clinton, Governor GWB, Ambassador GHWB, and Governor Carter. Perhaps after she left office the Clintons would be Governor and Senator Clintons, First Parents to President Chelsea Clinton.
And, I might add, each corporation is free to individually name and define its corporate executive structure, so I dispute that “president and CEO” has some kind of universally applicable connotation. I’m willing to be educated on that point, however.
Thanks, Gfactor.
I wish. We need people like her.
I’m sure he can go by any name he chooses, but he has chosen Bill. Given his Southern background, I’d reckon he doesn’t want to put on any airs.
I haven’t noticed this happening in the last fifteen years.
:rolleyes: First Parents? Is that like Queen Dowager?
Hey, come on, now. Don’t you think Mr. Bush has enough derogatory nicknames as it is?
A writer always writes in the proper format for the intended audience. Without knowing what audience you write for I can’t comment.
However, in general I could go with John Doe of Big Corp only if the context made clear what the status of the person was. Otherwise, John Doe could be the CEO, some random spokesperson, the janitor, or a disgruntled agitator.
However, if a title is used it has to be the exact proper title, not some variant that vaguely sounds good to you, or worse, something that you assume to be adequate because of your total ignorance of (or arrogance toward) the world you’re writing about. This applies to every writer everywhere.
And as somebody who used to work for government, I’m astonished that anybody here thought that any person working with the public to answer questions would be anything less than friendly and helpful. I’m sure that of the hundreds of thousands of workers in government, you could find an exception, but really. What did anybody expect to happen? The vast, overwhelming percentage of people who work for government do so because they sincerely want to help people by doing good. You can’t judge the people that answer phones by the elected officials that appear in the news.
P.S. Mr. Moto, what do you think of Willard Mitt Romney? Or, conversely, Freddie Dalton Thompson?
Madame President and her baby daddy.
Or maybe we should just let Bill become a Senator from New York the moment that Hillary takes office so that we could just say; “President and Senator Clinton” like we do now.
Switching into serious mode: I thought it was correct to call former presidents “Mr. President” and “President Carter” and so forth.
I think I’ve heard a group (a gaggle?, a murder?) of presidents referred to as, “Presidents Bush, Carter and Clinton,” when they were together at an event.
Former presidents are also just ‘presidents’, even if they are not THE president. And they are ‘President’ if you are using it as a title and/or to precede their name. A teacher would say: “name all the presidents, Suzy.” Rather than, “name all the former presidents and the current one, Suzy.”
I could be sooooooooo wrong about this, but it feels right to me.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with saying that one met President Carter during a recent trip to Georgia or whatever. But there does exist protocol on what people of various accomplishments should be called in formal situations: those rules say that Jimmy Carter is now formally introduced at stuffy occasions, as the Honorable Jimmy Carter, and he is politely and correctly spoken to as Mr. Carter.
So if you want to refer to former presidents as President So and so, or former governors as Governor Whatsit, go for it. It just means that the hoi palloi aren’t going to call and ask you for advice on the difference between formal and semiformal attire for an evening function.
(Hint: one of them involves a black tie. And it’s probably not the one you’re thinking of.)