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Bernie Sanders' 404 page

berniesanders.com

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Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#71

Post by [deleted] »

r3bl wrote: post #39
coldpie wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most manuals of style say that "Sanders's" is most correct, but will allow for "Sanders'". I strongly prefer the former. It's logical if you think of it: s' is always for plural nouns that end in S, 's is always for singular. "The cats' milk" vs "James's hand." This way also matches pronunciation. It gets tricky to keep straight when you have plural nouns that don't end in S. I know "Men's clothes" is correct. But I'…

Man, it's no wonder that people like me two aren't speaking English natively get confused about that whole *'s thing.

[deleted]

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#72

Post by alex_young »

coldpie wrote: post #54
matthewmacleod wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The fish's pond"? "The fishes' pond"? That's a pond belonging to a single fish ("The fish's pond") versus one belonging to multiple fish ("The fishes' pond"). You're completely right!

It's hard because the plural form of "fish" is usually "fish." I think we allow "fishes" when "fish" is ambiguous, like my example. Maybe we should just change to "fishes" all the time :)

Deep in the weeds here, but the plural of a single species of fish is 'fish', while multiple species of fish are 'fishes'.

'Swimming with the fishes' means you must have wound up on the wrong side of a boat in a diverse body of water. It would be a shame to have to 'swim with the fish'. So ambiguous.

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#73

Post by ethbro »

Someone1234 wrote: post #64
r3bl wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man, it's no wonder that people like me two aren't speaking English natively get confused about that whole *'s thing.

As a natively speaker let me just confirm: English is a very inconsistent language, where rules just as often result in doing the wrong thing as they do the right. Many native speakers get the 's/'/s/ies thing wrong, as well as two/too/to, and so on. I feel bad for anyone learning this language.

Maybe it's the trauma from compiler design, but in times of multiple stylistic options in English I try to trend towards standardization / the more broadly applicable version.

Drop in the bucket, but my small part towards decreasing the number of exceptions.

Edit: and just personally, I try to mentally associate homophones (two/too/to) with another word that helps clarify them (e.g. too:also).

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#74

Post by aqme28 »

incepted wrote: post #67
ceejayoz wrote: post #12

There seems to be a trend to interesting/funny 404s for presidential campaigns. https://www.barackobama.com/45325r/ has a "thanks, Obama" GIF meme. https://www.bobbyjindal.com/dfka blames the 404 on Obama with #ThanksObama" too.

Jindal's page has a donation gadget on its 404 page... Classy.

I fail to see what's wrong with that. Bernie's 404 lets you register for his email list.

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#75

Post by marktd »

jerf wrote: post #22
philangist wrote: post #6

I don't follow politics at all, but the more I read and hear about Bernie Sanders the more I like him. I'm sure we've got a few political experts on Hacker News so I'd love to hear if you guys think he actually has any chance of winning the presidency.

At this phase in the run, the punditariat is greatly, greatly more confident than the facts justify. I don't mean that specific to this year... I mean generically at this phase of the campaign. If the punditariat was correct at this phase, Hillary Clinton would not currently be able to run, because she'd be finishing out her second term, having defeated Rudy Guiliani in the 2008 campaign by a small but significant ma…

In 2000, both Gore and Bush were always the frontrunners, and then they both won the primaries in landslides. I believe they both won every state, except Bush lost New Hampshire to McCain. Also in 2008, you're exaggerating the extent to which the punditry favored Giuliani; he was a frontrunner, but not at all considered a shoo-in the way Hillary is.

The problem with Bernie is that he has very limited appeal outside of the areas where he's campaigning (overwhelmingly white, also a lot of college towns). He has a chance if he can improve his standing among minority voters somehow, but even then it's a long shot.

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#76

Post by js2 »

coldpie wrote: post #54
matthewmacleod wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The fish's pond"? "The fishes' pond"? That's a pond belonging to a single fish ("The fish's pond") versus one belonging to multiple fish ("The fishes' pond"). You're completely right!

It's hard because the plural form of "fish" is usually "fish." I think we allow "fishes" when "fish" is ambiguous, like my example. Maybe we should just change to "fishes" all the time :)

The plural "fish" is more than one fish of the same species. The plural "fishes" is multiple species. At least biologists make that distinction. edit: what Alex Young said.

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#78

Post by pilif »

Someone1234 wrote: post #64
r3bl wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man, it's no wonder that people like me two aren't speaking English natively get confused about that whole *'s thing.

As a natively speaker let me just confirm: English is a very inconsistent language, where rules just as often result in doing the wrong thing as they do the right. Many native speakers get the 's/'/s/ies thing wrong, as well as two/too/to, and so on. I feel bad for anyone learning this language.

> I feel bad for anyone learning this language.

clearly you have never tried out German :-)

As a German native speaker who generally has a lot of difficulty learning languages, I can assure you that English was a lot more feasible for me compared to anything else I tried.

(Of course you'll find an error in this comment - that is bound to happen in any comment talking about language mistakes)

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#79

Post by marktd »

javert wrote: post #35
philwelch wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He doesn't. Not even most of the Democratic base will vote for a white male socialist in his 70's over Hillary, and he has no chance of winning the general election even if he were nominated. Even he probably knows this and is only running to make a statement.

> Not even most of the Democratic base will vote for a white male socialist in his 70's over Hillary Why do you say that? I could perhaps be convinced, but at this point I don't see any reason to think that.

At the end of the day, the most electable candidate tends to get nominated. Not always, but typically. And Hillary, even despite her challenges, is much more electable than Bernie, because she's much closer to the center. Of course, continuing email controversies could change that. But unless they do, Bernie's chances of winning are near 0.

Re: Bernie Sanders' 404 page

#80

Post by coldpie »

Someone1234 wrote: post #64
r3bl wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man, it's no wonder that people like me two aren't speaking English natively get confused about that whole *'s thing.

As a natively speaker let me just confirm: English is a very inconsistent language, where rules just as often result in doing the wrong thing as they do the right. Many native speakers get the 's/'/s/ies thing wrong, as well as two/too/to, and so on. I feel bad for anyone learning this language.

Hey, at least we don't have goddamn gendered nouns. What an awful, awful idea that is.
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