Does it bug you when someone says "a" as a long a as in ape.

[patrice]

Everything is A (long a, as in pay) where most people would say "short" a, as in "a (uh - phonetically) big car . . . ." I should look up the old Little Brown grammar rule about this one, but mostly it's short as in "uh", phonetically. Long a (e.g. pay) is for nouns beginning with consonants, not vowells, also "an" for stuff beginning vowell or an h, as in an hour.

Bush uses long A (e.g. say) for everything. It sounds like he is reading most of the time.

[UL_Approved]

1. This is in the wrong forum

This needs to be posted in The Lounge.

[Bethany Rockafella]

2. ditto

:-)

[patrice]

3. Sorry. n/t

[Hoping4Change]

4. It bugs me too. But I'm intrigued at what prompted you today to

to post a thread about this pet peeve?

[patrice]

13. I think it every time I hear Bush, which I try not to, but I listened to

him a little recently. The basic conclusion that makes it important to me about the phonetic pronunciation of that article "a" is that it sounds VERY MUCH as though he is ALWAYS reading, not talking to us.

[Paranoid_Portlander]

5. It bugs me only when Bush says it, because...

... he comes across like an elementary school child who is reciting from a book, trying way too hard to pronounce the words properly, because he lacks reading skills and the proper neuronal connections.

[patrice]

14. Does not completely understand what he is saying, so he can't say it

himself, ergo, he reads it. Some president!

[UdoKier]

6. It's a southern affectation.

It used to be used for emphasis. They use that pronunciation in country western songs a lot, too.

[patrice]

15. Oh yeah, that IS true. n/t

[oasis]

7. Bush's condescending tempo is in perfect sync with a dumbed down America.

:dunce: x 60 million

[librechik]

8. only when Shrub does it

it's like he's saying "I can read. Very very precisely. Now aren't you ashamed that you think I'm stupid? I bet you're just jealous. Let's have a reading war. I bet I can pronounce all the hard words. Very slowly and precisely. So admire me, I'm smart!"

What a moron.

[truth2power]

9. Drives me nuts! Like a child just learning to read.

And why does this belong in the lounge? It's about Bush's speech patterns.

[DireStrike]

10. Another thing he does - "September THEE ELEVENTH"

He's such a clod.

[yinkaafrica]

11. you bet

[cheezus]

12. or we could accept that there are different dialects

and that people talk differently, and that there's nothing wrong with that

[patrice]

17. This is true. Part of it is the matter of style for "emphasis", surely

he doesn't talk this way one : one.

[Ravenseye]

16. He puts....

He puts the wrong em-PHA-sis on the wrong syl-LA-ble

[patrice]

18. This is also true. I taught high school for 10 years.

If I had a senior who talked like this, I would check his reading comprehension level, or try to get him to talk more extemporaneously.