better had ~ had better: syntax

[Laurence Horn]

>Another comment on 'better had', as in
>
>"Yo better had listen" = "It would be very advisable for you to listen"
>
>Is this difference in word order a reflection of what I think is an American
>tendency to be able to place adverbs before auxiliary verbs as a default,
>unemphatic position?

I don't think so.  This American is familiar with "had better"/"'d
better" (or of course just plain "better") and not with "better had",
so the variants are regionally and/or socially distributed within the
U.S.

Larry