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NNTP-Posting-Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2009 14:03:16 -0600
From: Egbert White <eggwhite@earthlink.net>
Newsgroups: alt.languages.english
Subject: Re: Is this correct English?
Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2009 12:02:56 -0800
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On Mon, 19 Jan 2009 15:39:11 +0000, Frederick Williams
<frederick.williams2@tesco.net> wrote:
>Seen here:
>http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/obama_inauguration/7837193.stm:
>
> Roads and bridges into Washington will be closed to traffic,
> with sniffer dogs on the subway.
>
>Is that correct English? I see no connection between what occurs before
>the comma and what occurs after.
It's correct English in the sense that it parses grammatically okay,
in the same sense that "I eat the window" would parse grammatically
okay.
It's bad English in that, although the intended meaning seems clear,
the way the statement is worded doesn't accurately express that
meaning. It seems reasonable to assume the writer meant the following
| Roads and bridges into Washington will be closed to traffic,
| and there will be sniffer dogs on the subway.
--
Egbert White, | "I love Americans, but not when they try
Planet Earth | to talk French. What a blessing it is that
| that they never try to talk English."
| -- Saki's Mrs. Mebberley
|
|