Here's an exception to the rule: When the code obviously does not work, would never have worked and there's no good excuse for it having been committed.
Example: Suppose you have a requirement to display times in a zone different than the system time. Simply appending the new time zone offset at the end of the existing time stamp should prompt obviously would not accomplish that. It should merit at least a private invoking of "Who Wrote This Awful Code?" if someone comes upon it in the code base, followed perhaps by "Why am I the first person to notice this?"
The first question might answer why something that silly came into being. The second question can help you decide between fixing it or just cutting it if nobody noticed it was broken that long.
Example: Suppose you have a requirement to display times in a zone different than the system time. Simply appending the new time zone offset at the end of the existing time stamp should prompt obviously would not accomplish that. It should merit at least a private invoking of "Who Wrote This Awful Code?" if someone comes upon it in the code base, followed perhaps by "Why am I the first person to notice this?"
The first question might answer why something that silly came into being. The second question can help you decide between fixing it or just cutting it if nobody noticed it was broken that long.