tense

Where’s Dvorkin when I need him? Why the hell do we call it the “present perfect” when it involves verbs conjugated in the past tense, and refers exclusively to events that happened in the past?

If my children grow up to be average Americans I’ll have failed them as a parent.

If they spend four hours a day watching other people live on a television screen.  If they’re bored.

If they go to school to get a job so their kids can go to school so they can get a job so their kids can go to school...If they’re without purpose.

I rather slammed this morning but I had to share this list from Neatorama about the nastiest elections in history.

Here’s an example from the campaigning files of Thomas Jefferson vs. John Adams:

From ABC:

In the video, Paul did not use the words “drop out,” opting instead to say the campaign is “winding down,” and he encourages supporters to still cast votes for him. But he referred to his campaign in the past tense.

I know I can spin this in a pro-Paul way.  Hang on–let me think of something.

Billboard's Ed Christman recently wrote about Wal-Mart's push for lower CD prices and a tiered pricing plan. In a nutsell, hits would be $12 and different levels of catalog at $9, $7 and $5. A proposed promotional program would put the top ten or 15 titles at $10.