Safire was using sarcasm through those examples to get his point across.
https://www.nytimes.com/1979/11/04/archives/on-language-the-...
> • Verbs has to agree with their subjects.
But I saw what happened. Googling Safire's rules, the "helpful" top result via Google quoted a source that misquoted Safire, which I'm guessing is how it made it into your comment. So no worries.
It's much appreciated!
Safire was using sarcasm through those examples to get his point across.