[ExI] miscommunication (was: Yet another health care debate)

[Damien Broderick]

At 04:10 PM 9/24/2008 -0400, JKC wrote:

>>Suppose someone wrote:
>>"Al Queda do sometimes blow up Americans,
>>but we are trying to hunt them down and kill them."
>
>>How likely is it that you'd think "them" referred to "Americans"?
>>The grammar is identical.
>
>Not likely at all because the word "but" is the giveaway, you're a
>literary man you should know that. It's a pity Billk didn't have 
>something like that "but" is his post.

Oh, you mean in this paragraph he wrote that you quoted a little earlier?

"Extreme libertarians do, from time to time, bring up the
suggestion of letting all the poor, mentally disabled, physically
disabled, etc. fall by the wayside (evolution in action), but we
are trying to civilize them."

As I said earlier, godawmighty.