[Dean's World] Dean: "Rarely is the question asked: are children learning?"

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Posted by Dean:
"Rarely is the question asked: are children learning?"
http://www.deanesmay.com/posts/1151046548.shtml


   I heard a politician say this in 2000. He slightfly flubbed the second
   clause, starting out by saying "is," then hesitated and slightly shook
   his head, correcting himself, then went on: "...are children
   learning?"

   This is now routinely misquoted as, "Is our children learning?"

   Here's one of more recent vintage, from the same politician:

   "I tell people, let's don't fear the future, let's shape it."

   More sanely punctuated, that would read, "I tell people: let's don't
   fear the future. Let's shape it."

   "Let us not" would be preferred by grammarians, but grammarians want
   us to speak a variety of English that has never been spoken by any
   living person. It is otherwise a perfectly common everyday
   colloquialism, and would be considered of no great import if spoken by
   anyone else in almost any other context.

   Language Log has [1]much more to say about the 'Bushisms' industry,
   with quotes that will make a few people squirm.

   Me? I've never found these things more than moderately irksome, but I
   pretty much laugh at anyone who complains to me about pettiness and
   out-of-context quotes and childish cheap shots in politics, but then
   obsesses over so-called "Bushisms."

   To a certain extent, you have to learn to let stuff like that go when
   you talk politics. The more obsessed you are with such things, the
   less important your ideas must be after all.

   (Via [2]Althouse.)

References

   1. http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/%7Emyl/languagelog/archives/003277.html
   2. http://althouse.blogspot.com/