We know what will be all over the news and the DU boards for the next

few weeks or so: attempts by Congress to exercise its Constitutional oversight duty, and attempts by BushCo to block oversight by claiming executive privilege.

Therefore, I would like to help all those who will post on this topic by letting them know that the proper spelling is "privilege," not "priviledge."

It isn't a big deal, of course, but knowing in advance how to spell the word might help people discuss the topic more comfortably.

Thank you.

We will now return to our regularly scheduled program.

:rofl:

:rofl:

I am not the Grammar Police. I would never call a DU member out for making an error in grammar or usage, but I must admit that seeing "priviledge" a hundred times a day does wear on me. It's sort of like hearing fingernails on a blackboard.

I expect to see "priviledge" quite a lot, but I am hoping that a heads up might reduce its occurrence. I also think a lot of people actually would prefer to know the proper spelling of a word they are going to post frequently on a public site. I mean, think about how often the guy with the "Get a Brain Morans" sign is held up for ridicule here on DU.

they have no prepositions in their language. So they never need to say "you shouldn't end a sentence with with.............lol.

See my articles on this topic:

"It's Usually Not Wrong to End a Sentence with a Preposition"
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/prepositions1.html

"Prepositions at the Ends of Sentences: Further Explanation of Why the 'Rule' Is Wrong"
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/prepositions2.html

What looks like a preposition in such sentences is actually an adverbial particle in a phrasal verb. In other words, it isn't really a peposition at all, but part of the verb itself. It should not be separated from the other part of the verb.

On the other hand, you might want to be careful about ending a sentence with a proposition.

My daughter has got a Finnish friend on the IMDB Lostboard : I'll get her to check............lol.

Maybe Finnish ladies they just don't :rofl:

My two pet peeves about spelling are sepArate (not sepErate) and pUrsue, not pErsue. Those two misspellings are my fingernails on the blackboard moments.

I have two articles that cover some of those common errors (including seperate/separate; alot/a lot):

"Ten Common but Easily Corrected Errors"
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/tenerrors.html

and

"Son of Ten Common Errors"
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/son.html

I also have a few other articles that deal with some problematic word pairs (e.g., "flout" vs. "flaunt"; "flounder" vs. "founder") that readers have asked me to address.

I have them bookmarked. I would also love to read your other articles that you mentioned in your post. Could you send me the link to those as well?

I have thought of another word that really gets to me. I hate it when people use the word "your" when they need the contraction for you are, "you're."

One of those commonly misspelled legal words, like "judgment" being spelled "judgement."

Or confusion between "statute" and "statue."

The law is confusing, even for spelling.

"Judgement" is the British spelling.

is plain fucking arrogance.

some spellings to "Americanize" them when he produced his An American Dictionary of the English Language in 1828. That is why we have such differences as

theater/theatre
dialog/dialogue
catalog/catalogue
analog/analogue
criticize/criticise

that the same has now happened to make the US print of the Complete Oxford English Dictionary differ from ours - most odd . Never mind - at least DU can't be respelt..lol.

Though in professional/court type settings you'd never see it used, it is acceptable for use in casual discussion.

The proper spelling for "President Bush" is actually "Ignorant Douchebag."

That is all. :)

and there are always those who will jump down your throat for it.

That was my only point.

On my site I have an article entitled "When is a Comma Splice Not an Error?":
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/spliceok.html

In that article I point out that there are some "rules" that are worth defying in order to promote more reasonable usage (e.g., the false rule about prepositions at the ends of sentences).

But some other "rules," though they not actually rules but merely general preferences, are not necessarily worth fighting over. No matter what, you are going to run afoul of the self-appointed Grammar Police if you break whichever shibboleth they have adopted as their own. Since you are often not going to be there to defend your written work, you need to be judicious about which "rules" you choose to break.

I always defy the no prepositions at the ends of sentences "rule," because to follow it is to write hideously deformed and ridiculous sentences. But I never break the comma splice rule, even in sentences where it really would be appropriate to ignore it, simply because it is easy to write sentences without comma splices, and to include even acceptable comma splices in a situation where I would not be there to defend my choice would make a lot of people assume that I don't understand the most basic rule of sentence boundaries.

Basically, you have to balance your interests when deciding whether to buck the dominant prejudice on usage.

judgement is correct - in England. I feel the English of Britain should have the final say over proper spelling, if not pronounciation of the English language. Its a judgement call.

edit: and welcome to hell, er, I mean DU :evilgrin:

And "it's a judgement call".

:hide:

You found the delibarate errers.

At least you didn't insist on 'judgment' to.

He deliberately "Americanized" the spelling of several words. Part of his purpose was to differentiate the new country's langage from that of the old country it had wrenched its freedom from just a few decades earlier.

that if the Bushies go nuts and decide to declare martial law, it's spelled martial, not marshal. Federal marshals are the guys who will go get KKKarl and Gonzo when they defy their subpoenas, not supenas or sopenas or other weird variant spellings.

Thank you. Carry on. :)

It is a priviledge to be able to post liberel thoughts on this board. We need to discuss the misdoeings of this adminstration.

I'm really growing weary of all the misspelled words I see here.

There's no excuse since DU has a Spell Check.

:rofl:

hehe.

thanks for the post -- I enjoyed it.

It is "for all intents and purposes" not "for all intensive purposes," and "regardless" not "irregardless." The latter of which I had used all my life up until a few weeks ago when I was informed it was not a proper word. I don't know though--"irregardless" seems to flow off of your tongue a lot nice than "regardless." Something about that extra syllable.

:shrug:

to allegation. :rofl: It's allege.

:silly:

got to do with pledge :)

Call it a draw especially as I see you're a helper in N.O.

my comments were silly sarcasim and nothing more. There can be no draw when no contest had.

I'm a Katrina survivor, that doesn't mean I need your pity or to be granted an excuse. I was playing games and being a smart ass.

I do that from time to time when folks post silly threads. :silly:

:hi:

I didn't realise you'd suffered personally from Katrina. I'd thought you were providing volantary help. Thoughts are with you. :hi:

not the country of Germany! Get it right!

I hope I don't appear stupid but, I have seen defense/defence in regard to the military. Which is correct?

In proper names, don't change the spelling to your country's. It is the Ministry of Defence, and the Secretary of Defense.

I have a couple of articles on my Grammar and Usage for the Non-Expert site that deal with differences between American and English Usage (including the way we place periods and commas with quotations marks and the way we use single and double quotation marks):

"American vs. British Usage"
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/british.html

"Quotation Marks: Where Do the Periods and Commas Go--And Why?"
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/inside.html

"Single vs. Double Quotation Marks: Once Again British and American Usage Differ"
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/singlequotationmark.html

that I make fewer errors when I'm really angry. I make the most when I'm feeling guilty about taking time to write something. (If there are no errors in this message it's not because I'm angry - it's because the message is short.) Also, I think I would make fewer mistakes if I got new glasses and the background for internet screens wasn't snow white.

I must admit that I sometimes like to break some rules. Purposely.

readers frequently email me with questions. I am always glad to respond, and if the question is one that I think would be of general interest, I also post an article on it. (If not, I just send the email response.)

If you happen to read any of my articles, you will see that many of them start off with a shout-out to whichever reader posed the question that prompted the article. And if the reader happens to have a website of his/her own to publicize, I also include a link.

specific articles on the site. Here is the link to the homepage for the site:
Grammar and Usage for the Non-Expert
http://www.grammartips.homestead.com/index.html

BTW, if you go to the homepage of any of my sites, including this one, you will also find a list of links to my other nine public sites. I write on a wide variety of topics that you might find interesting.

Also, every article and every page on each one of my sites has at the bottom a link to the homepage for that site and a link to the article index for that site. In other words, you can easily navigate through all 450 of the articles on my 10 sites from any article on any of the sites.

:thumbsup:

--p!

:D

like an outhouse on a cliff.

taught to use "Z"s.

and that he is the decider, that he wants martial law, not marshall law!

:hi:

"Lose". Not "loose". An oooo sound doesn't necessarily mean more than one o.

It's "martial law", not "marshall law" or "marital law". Please, please, PLEASE spell that one correctly.

You're is a contraction. That means it's (a contraction of 'it is', by the by) TWO WORDS: 'you' and 'are'. You wouldn't say "this is you are book"; why would you say "this is you're book"?

:grr: