Foibles of the Mother Tongue

       Yesterday's L.A. Times spoke of Major League Baseball players desiring stiffer penalties for use of Performance Enhancing Drugs.  One sentence ended with this peculiarity:  "exactly the kind of hypocrisy rank-and-final union members want to end."

       "Rank-and-final?"  How did this happen?   First, no spell-check would catch it.  Second, doubtful any other human being (like an editor?) read the article before it was published.  Third then, how did the journalist come to using it?

       Perhaps he misheard "rank-and-file" before he ever saw it in print, figured it's the ordinary folks who in a democracy have the "final" say. 

       I had seen a similar expression go astray.  A close election race was described as "neck in neck."  I feel sure the journalist heard it that way first, and it stuck!