it's wrong. it's = it is. its = possessive.

I'm a retired history, investments and entrepreneurship professor. I spent more than two years in Spanish archives studying the Spanish Civil War, where Germany's Nazis and Italy's fascists got their first tryout. When I interviewed exiled veterans of that war in 1976 and 1981, I had a responsibility to accurately use their experience and the evidence they gave me.

Our era of superficial and sloppy use of language and hybrid disinformation warfare has only increased my aversion to using words like frisbees--throw them out there to see if they'll fly. So I always defend this basic concept: words have precise meaning' what you call literal I call precise and rigorous. I always told my students, "you are responsible for arguments you unintentionally imply by misuse of terminology."

I've engaged you on a detail to illustrate this concept and to defend all those with accumulated expertise and knowledge now under assault by disinformation warriors who think the opinions of those with expertise and evidence and those expressing evidence-free nonsense are created equal. The latter gave us Berlusconi, Brexit, Trump, Orban, Putin, Erdogan, Meloni, LePen, Wilders. The destruction of intellectual rigor and respect for those who practice it is a planetary problem.

When I was a grad student 40 years ago I benefited greatly from those who pointed out my own sloppy reasoning. I hope this exchange will increase your intellectual rigor and the precision of your writing.