blind sighted

[Herb Stahlke]

I found the following in a posting on the MSNBC letters list,
referring to Katie Couric's interview of Charlton Heston:

"He parted the Red Sea and a little girl half his size blind
sighted him??? He put himself in the position by being the head of
the NRA."

In my speech, with Canadian Raising, I distinguish between the
diphthongs of "sided" and "sighted."  I found this collocation
with the meaning of "surprised" in only a few cases in two web
searches, with different search engines.  Is it simply a phonetic
confusion, or is the expression gaining ground?

Herb Stahlke